The Last Conduit
by mythic of murderdome
Summary: 5 years after Cole defeated the beast and cured the plague the cordyceps virus decimated the world. Zaroff a 15 year old conduit, while exploring Boston found a group of smugglers and a little girl. Now he is on a quest to find the fireflies and possibly save all of mankind
1. A New Day

**WELL WELL WELL WELCOME TO MY NEW STORY, TO BE HONOST I HAD THIS STORY IN MY HEAD DURING MY LAST STORY THE ENTIRE TIME AND I JUST COULDNT WAIT TO WRITE THIS ONE SO I HOPE YOU ENJOY IT AS MUCH AS I WROTE IT.**

I was born five years into the cordyceps outbreak or in other words I was born into a five-year pile of shit. my real name is Tony but I call myself Zaroff cause what's more intimidating then a name that starts with a Z? I was born in the small city of New Marais, my parents told me about a wonderful Man named Cole magrath who stopped a creature called "The Beast" about 5 years before the outbreak and cured a major disease only known as the plague and as a result him and everyone else with what was called a "conduit gene" died but that didn't prevent anymore from being born.

That is what I realized at 8 years old, cause I was born with the conduit gene. How I found my powers is a strange tale, I was looking around with my father for some food to scavenge when we were attacked by an infected pack. I tried to run but tripped, as my dad came to rescue me he shot and killed about five of the group of six runners but one of them was on top of me, when I lifted my arm to defend myself I was terrified to see ice magically appear from air and encase me in a fortress made of ice and it destroyed the runners skull. When I looked behind me I saw my dads skull pierced going down his skull past his lower jaw by the ice.

I was broken down in tears by what had just happened but what I ignored is my internal body temperature dropping to a point below zero. When I returned to my mother with no food and one less man she cried as well, she ran over to comfort me. Moment she did she let go from the sheer cold of my body temperature wich was now negative twenty-five degrees farenheit. Her body couldn't handle the sudden change in temperature so now she was suffering from hypothermia, from touching me! When I brought a blanket to warm her she was already dead.

I had survived another seven years drifting from group to group, With that logic I was a fifteen year old conduit traveling america with the ability to control ice. Soon my travels brought me to a place called Boston where I decided to hang out the nearest shelter set up by the FEDRA. I was walking near the trenches of one area when I heard shouting and gun shots, I hid behind a truck while still managing to stay quite I heard a girl saying

"yeah we fucked those guys up"

I heard her shout something when she saw my white hair protruding out of the trucks side. I had curly Hair coming down to my neck So it was hanging down. I heard a middle-aged man and a woman tell me to come out slowly. I came out with my hands up and decided to try something, The night was cold and the rain was freezing so I tried playing the lost little kid suffering from hypothermia. When I came out with my hands out I began to shiver and breathe slowly.

"are you alright kid?" asked the man,

when they lowered their guns I summoned ice shards aimed for their throats

"Put down the guns NOW" I said with sudden energy

"HOLY SHIT" the girl said.

They dropped their guns and I lowered my ice shards but still aimed for them

"who are you?" asked the man

"names Zaroff, tell me yours?" I asked

he said with a calm tone "my name is Joel, this is Tess, and the girl is Ellie" he talked with a southern drawl.

"I'm going to put these down now so if any of you even think of going for your guns I will send these through both of your heads"

they nodded. When I set the shards down I decided to make small talk

"so how are you doing? me? I'm just fine" I said,

Joel picked up the scanner from the dead FEDRA troop and his eyes went wide with shock

"what the fuck!" he exclaimed

"hey let me see that" said Tess

"What are we doing smuggling an infected kid!?" exclaimed Joel

"Wait Would Marlene set us up?" asked Tess

"I'm not infected!" said Ellie

"then explain this!" exclaimed Joel showing her the red scanner.

She rolled up her sleeve and showed them a healed bite mark "This is three weeks old!" she exclaimed.

"No, bullshit people turn within three days of being bit you stop bullshitting" exclaimed Tess

"it's three weeks, I swear" said Ellie.

"I don't think she's bullshitting you guys" I said amazed "are you the cure?" I asked

"I guess, I don't know just please believe me" she started to plead

"let's go" I heard Joel say

"what you can't be serious?" said Tess

"we will get more information when we reach our stop".

After a few more testaments from Tess we heard the FEDRA soldiers radio telling us they are sending back up to our location.

"well crap!" I said

"let's go now" Joel said

"I'll give them something to shoot at you get out of here" I said

"what! don't be stupid kid" Joel exclaimed

"just trust me" I didn't give him a chance to speak before Tess pulled him down the trenches.

I waited for the troops to start looking inside the trenches. I waited for the right time then I sent an ice shard over to a guard looking in the trench who just noticed Ellie.

"HEY FUCK HEAD OVER HERE" I screamed.

Soon I had an entire army shooting at me! This was going to be fun, I ducked and rolled under cover avoiding them and occasionally sending an ice shard in their direction. After a few minutes I saw the last of them enter a pipe at the end of the trenches, I jumped in after them. After climbing through the sewage I came to a clearing with them in it under a grate

"that was awesome" I couldn't help but say,

Joel turned around and said "okay we made it so tell me what are you?" he asked with resent,

"hey you gotta buy me dinner first" I said jokingly, Ellie chuckled at that. Just because we're in the apocalypse doesn't mean I can't have fun does it?

"Cut the crap" Joel said

"fine but you owe me that dinner later, so where to start... I was born with a rare genetic mutation called the conduit gene, and basically people can activate this in situations of extreme duress and can control some form of the elements, as you could see by moi I am Aquakinetic" I explained this to my best understanding.

"so what you mean to tell me is that you were born with fancy magic power's, holy crap that's awesome" said Ellie

"and if you don't mind I can tag along with you after all I managed to distract an entire army for you guys" I said.

"Fine" said Joel angry for whatever reason.

"Are you serious we are actually taking a freak with us?" asked Tess

"YES we get to keep him" said Ellie

"were all going to die" said Tess as we wandered out of the clearing and into the shambled remains of a fallen city.


	2. The Ruins

When I looked at the desolated landscape of what used to be a city I couldn't help but stare, as well Ellie. We had a lot in common when it came to our thirst to explore I may have crossed the country but I have never seen anything like this.

"wow that looks so crazy" that was really the only way I could express the sight in front of me.

"I know right it looks all sorts of messed up" replied Ellie

"come on let's get moving" said Joel

"to where exactly? this doesn't look like a safe drop" I said while looking over the edge.

"No were going through there" Tess said pointing to a ledge leading inside the skyscraper.

"Oh yeah cause nothing bad happens in rickety, old, and destroyed skyscrapers" I said as sarcastically as possible

"quit your whining and lets move" Said Joel.

We started to move through the skeleton of the skyscraper. A couple of minutes of idle chat went by between Joel and Tess while me and Ellie were sight-seeing. After a few minutes we found a door blocked up by a dead body with fungus growing all over it

"oh, fucking sick" said Ellie, repulsed and holding back a gag,

"yep well that's what a few years of infection can do to you" said Joel as he moved the body.

We continued until we found a door blocked from the other side, Tess was trying to force it open but called for Joel to help. They pushed the door open after a couple tries and Joel accidentally stumbled through. We heard a Clicker running for Joel and pin him to the floor, Tess kicked it off and killed it with a shiv to the head.

"Thank you" said Joel,

"bet you'll forget about it tomorrow" she replied.

"that thing looks ugly as hell!" said Ellie

We continued to move forward till we reached a small office room with a live clicker in it.

"get down" said Joel as quietly as possible,

we all got down and hid behind a desk while the clicker continued to search for something to eat, I decided to show off a bit more here. I stood up getting an angry response from Joel

"what the hell are you doing?" he said.

I got my powers ready and they all looked with wide eyes as I turned myself into a blue mist and flew towards the ledge we had to get too. I materialized and made a quick ice block and threw it away from them to distract the clicker and give them a chance to get over here. The clicker responded to the breaking ice with a startled response and started heading in its direction. Everyone made haste towards the ledge, I pulled everyone up as if they were bricks, not that heavy but still a little effort required. When we went down the ledge I got another set of questions

"how did you do that?" asked Joel

"well try to follow along, you see I can turn myself into condensed air like how cold molecules get together and basically fly in any direction I need to go" once again not the best explanation

"alright, so you're a flying ice-cube?" said Ellie,

I couldn't help but laugh at that. Soon we found out that the way we needed to go was blocked and the only way through was a fucking rickety ledge.

"This doesn't look safe at all" I said

"well you're the one that can fly" said Tess.

"Touche" I replied,

Ellie was the first ,Tess was second, I was third, and Joel was the last through. Soon we started to scale the ledge of the building. Little information about me I am TERRIFIED of heights so being on the ledge of a skyscraper was not a happy time for me I was breathing like I was looking death in the face. We entered back inside when we saw a broken window, when we got inside I finally regained my composure,

"okay lets never do that again" said Ellie, you said it girl.

We continued down the skyscraper where we met a room full of infected that Joel took down like a ninja. he pulled a desk drawer out of the entrance letting us through. We found something to prop his side of the door with and he crawled through, now we continued through the bowels of the beast. We went down a few broken floors till we reached what looked like a subway system. We saw the bodies of a few fireflies,

"lets hope there is a few alive at the drop off" said Joel.

We all entered a room filled with clickers, Joel took point while I followed his lead. We had cleared the room luckily with the help of my well-aimed and sharpened shards of ice. we climbed up a ladder that led to a real tunnel system. we climbed up a broken road into the outside world again. Soon we started to make our way to the capital building once again, there was a truck blocking our path so I jumped on top of the thing with some minor praise, however the truck made some noise causing some runners from a nearby building to come at us. they took care of them when Tess spoke up

"They just turned, that means there is more in the area, we should keep moving" Tess said,

"way ahead of you" I said pulling them up.

when we came across the other side we saw a chain that pulled open a garage door, when Joel started to pull on it he alerted our presence to more infected

"double time it" said Tess

"oh shit" exclaimed Joel.

"Screw that it's taking too long" I exclaimed,

I summoned a pillar of ice to push up the door and let us through, moment we were in I destroyed the pillar readying a barrage of ice spikes for anything that entered. We heard only banging and soon they gave up their pursuit. we continued forward on our quest to the capital building.


	3. In Shambles

Joel had no idea what to think of this kid. Was he a menace? An ally? All these thoughts wandered in his mind while inside the garage to what looked like a museum. They continued down the halls when they saw a collapsed floor blocking the path.

"Here I'll lift it, you three get through" said Joel as he lifted a wooden board making a small opening.

As everyone was entering he noticed Zaroff was taking his time and was looking up at the pile of rubble he was supporting up.

"Joel get out-of-the-way" he said a little freaked out

"What why?" Joel asked confused

"just move" Zaroff said.

Soon Joel realized why, the floor was caving in, he quickly got out-of-the-way but Tess and Ellie were on the other side.

"you okay?" asked Joel,

they heard clickers on Tess's side of the room,

"shit Ellie get behind me, you guys find us" said Tess as she was backing off into the room behind her with clickers following them

"shit, let's get moving" said Joel.

"couldn't agree more" Zaroff said as they entered the corridor leading to the stairwell,

Joel continued up the stairs with Zaroff behind him.

"It's too quiet" Joel said concerned for Tess's safety,

the girl would be fine, she's small, she can hide. When they reached upstairs more thoughts began to creep inside Joel's mind

"why did I agree to bring this kid with us, what if he's dangerous? stupid!".

He heard a scream coming from the next room and when he barged in he saw both Ellie and Tess being attacked by runners. Zaroff barreled down to Ellie, he pulled the runner off her and grabbed the runner by its head, then he started to gauge the things eyes out! That wasnt the scary part, as Joel was getting the runner off Tess he noticed the runner that Zaroff was maiming's head was slowly turning into a ball of ice.

"holy shit what did you do to that thing!?" exclaimed Ellie when she saw its head turn brittle and break to pieces. he panted and said

"That is what happens when I so much as touch someone for too long" Zaroff said,

I can't believe my fucking eyes! Joel thought looking at the pieces of melting ice he is a lot more dangerous then he thought. At first he looked like a stupid kid. He regained his composure and motioned for everyone to take the emergency ladder up to the roof. When on the roof they all saw the Capitol building was a lot closer than last time, and the sun was now beginning to shine.

"Come on let's get moving" Said Joel,

he saw Zaroff taking a running lead and jumped off the fucking roof,

"WHAT THE HELL!" everyone exclaimed as they saw Zaroff disappear from view and down to the pavement below.

When they looked over the edge of the building Ellie started to laugh hysterically as she saw Zaroff scaling the building in front of them and managed to get to the roof

"What the hell was that kid?" Joel exclaimed

"what? don't jump off building too?" said Zaroff as if nothing happened.

He made a bridge out of ice from his roof to the museums roof.

"The ice is rough so you don't have to worry about slipping off, just take it slow and you'll be fine" he said from across the roof,

"you have to be kidding me" said Joel,

"It's better then doing it the other way" said Ellie.

After doing some more roof crossing for a half an hour they reached the streets below, they noticed that the street was flooded

"just so its out there, I can't swim" said Ellie

"it looks shallow on the right side just follow me" said Tess.

"So what now?" Zaroff asked as they were crossing the shallow water to the building.

"we drop off the girl, we get our gear, and we go" said Joel,

when they pushed open the doors their hopes were destroyed when they came to a room of dead bodies belonging to the fireflies.

"no, no, NO, NO" exclaimed Tess who began searching the bodies,

"what are you doing?" asked Joel

"mabey they have a map or something to tell us where they were going".

"We tried Tess! how far are we going to take this?" asked Joel,

"as far as it needs to go!" she exclaimed

"let's just go" said Joel

"I'm not going anywhere Joel" she said.

"what are you talking about?" he asked,

she revealed a bite mark on her shoulder, the room went silent when she showed her bite. She grabbed Ellie's arm showing her bite

"this is three weeks Joel! I was bitten a half hour ago now look at it, this is fucking real Joel!" she exclaimed.

"you have to get her to tommy he ran with the fireflies he'll know where to go" she was interrupted by a FEDRA truck sending troops off at the entrance,

"crap what do we do?" Zaroff asked

"you guys go I'll buy you some time" said Tess

"what!" exclaimed Joel

"I will not turn into one of those things, just go!" she exclaimed

With a hurt expression and a hesitant wait he finally spoke "Ellie, Zaroff lets move" he said.

"I'm sorry I didn't mean for any of this to happen!" Ellie said.

After they reached the next set of doors Joel's mind began to move again, Tess was going to die all because of this kid! Why was he still doing this, doesn't matter he had to think of a plan. He decided to get to bill's town he needed to get a vehicle.

"we just left her to die!" exclaimed Ellie

"we have to get upstairs" said Joel.

Zaroff was already waiting, When they got upstairs they heard shooting and Tess's last scream. they saw a broken floor that led to an outside window, that led to more rooms. When they got through the window Joel saw another dead firefly carrying with him a hunting rifle he took it and they entered what looked like a two-way hallway where they saw more FEDRA troops coming. They took cover behind some desks,

"I have a plan" said Zaroff, "Ellie follow my lead, Joel stay down no matter what" he asked

"what?" Joel questioned

"just do it" Zaroff said.

Zaroff slowly got out of cover with his arms raised

"please help us! we wandered in here running from an infected woman".

A FEDRA troop lowered his shotgun asking "we?"

"it's okay you can get up the good men will help us" Zaroff said to Ellie

"Were not infected were just lost and hungry" she said.

"okay follow me and we will do a mandatory sc- WHAT THE FU-" he was cut off as his body was encased in ice.

"GO I'll cover you guys, wait for me outside!" exclaimed Zaroff.

Joel and Ellie started running down the hall while they heard a barrage of gunshots from the guards now attacking Zaroff. They made it outside where they still heard gunshots from the building, then the shots stopped all of sudden.

"Is he okay?" asked Ellie,

she was answered by Zaroff barging out of the building with a bleeding arm,

"MOVE THERE ARE MORE ON THE WAY" he exclaimed.

Joel knew what that meant, start running! They saw the entrance to a subway system and went down it

"Shit spores!" exclaimed Joel as he put on his gas mask

"you got an extra mask?" asked Zaroff

"always carry a spare" he said while pulling one out for his backpack.

"thanks, what about you" Zaroff said while pointing at Ellie,

"i'm immune remember" she corrected

"right" he said.

They entered the subway station where Zaroff blocked the entrance with thick ice.

"No more issues for us" he said after he was finished with the entrance.

That's when we noticed a new problem, the subway was flooded and Ellie can't swim, the ice may be thick but not indestructible and they heard the FEDRA troops attempting to break it in!


	4. Bill's Town

**AUTHORS NOTE: I HAVE HIDDEN AN EASTER EGG INSIDE THE TEXT, IF ANYONE FINDS IT FEEL FREE TO MESSAGE ME **

Ellie was freaking out the only way out was through here and a flooded gate but she can't swim.

"We have to get out of here!" Ellie exclaimed

"I know that but the subway is flooded and you can't swim we have to think of a plan" Joel said.

"I have one but I need to know something" She heard Zaroff say

"what is it kid?" Joel said

"I can freeze the water so we can walk across to the exit but I use energy when I use my powers and this will take a lot of energy so I might pass out from exhaustion and I need to know, will you carry me out of here or should I look forward to not waking up" Zaroff explained.

Joel was silent for a moment as the ice began to crack from the constant blows from the soldiers behind it

"Joel you seriously aren't considering this are you? we have to take him" Ellie said

"I'm willing to do it either way I just need to know!".

The ice was almost broken

"FINE" he exclaimed,

relief swept over Ellie knowing no more people will have to die today. Zaroff began to freeze the water but as he went on he started to look exhausted but he kept going to the point where he looked like his eyes were going to pop out of his sockets. When he finally managed to coat the water in ice the barrier he made had broken and he collapsed.

"Hurry Joel I'll prop him up on the wall you pick him up then me" Ellie said,

Joel climbed over the earthquake stricken ledge and grabbed a hold of Zaroffs hand and pulled upwards. After he was on the pavement outside he held his hand out for Ellie. While she was being pulled up the FEDRA troops started to fire at them hitting Ellie in the leg.

"Ow fuck!" she exclaimed while being pulled up,

When they got up Joel found a dumpster to cover the exit so they can't climb up.

"Can you walk?" asked Joel

"yeah I'm fine I think" said Ellie.

Joel started to carry Zaroff towards their new destination, Bills Town. Ellie began to wonder as they were trekking across the country

"why wasn't Joel freezing up?" didn't he say that if anyone touches him they freeze to death?

Maybe cause he passed out? Either way they set up a place to for the night ,they were running for an entire day so they deserved a rest she thought. She fell asleep almost as soon as she closed her eyes on the soft, cool dirt. Ellie awoke a few hours later in the dead of night to the sound of rustling.

"What the fuck?" she whispered to herself,

She readied her knife and slowly approached the sound. When she was about 3 meters away when she heard Zaroff who was now awake and he was... singing? He sung in a sad and hurt tone.

"I see.. your star, you left it burning for me, mother, I'm here.. eyes open wide, feel your heart and its glowing, I'm welcome home, sweet home" he sung sadly.

Ellie sheathed her knife and approached Zaroff

"you're a singer too?" she asked,

he was startled by the sudden change of company

"what! oh its you, no it's just an old lullaby my mother used to sing for me when I was young" he answered,

Ellie sat down beside him.

"so how did you get your super fancy magic powers?" Ellie asked,

she saw Zaroff tense up at the question "I was being attacked by a runner and they just appeared" he answered hastily.

"oh okay, so why ice?" she asked

"I don't get to decide that, it was just what nature intended" he answered.

"Okay... can I touch your face?" she asked,

"what?!" he exclaimed surprised.

She wanted to know if he was really as cold as he said when he had turned that runner to ice.

"I guess, just poke me okay don't get too close" he said,

Ellie stood up saying

"why am I too hot for you?" she said this as she put one hand too her head, and one to her hip while making the "sexy" pose.

"do you want the honest answer or the compliment answer?" he asked

"the compliment answer would be nice" Ellie said

"well then you hotter than a thousand suns" he said sarcastically,

"don't be an ass about it, fine honest answer" Ellie felt like she was going to regret this.

"I need to start to where I first found my powers, me and my father were scavenging when we alerted a group of infected, I tripped on something and when a runner was on top of me I decapitated it with a wall of ice, however what I didn't know was my father was right behind me and the ice I created punctured his skull" he finished for a second

"wow that's pretty crappy" Ellie said trying her best to comfort him.

"when I came back home without him my mother saw me cry and tried to comfort me cause but when she hugged me she started to die from hypothermia, my body temperature had changed drastically when I discovered my powers and her body wasnt ready for such a sudden change when she hugged me, her heart slowed down to a stop just because she hugged me!" he said all this on the verge of tears.

"sorry I asked, that must suck though" Ellie said,

"You couldn't have known it's not your fault" he said.

The silence hung over them till Zaroff broke it

"hey I know what can cheer us both up, follow me" he said while getting up quickly,

"uh okay, OUCH" she fell over when her leg strained to get up "son of a bitch that hurts" she Exclaimed

"what's wrong?" zaroff asked.

"while you were passed out some fucker shot me in the leg" she explained

"hold on I got just the thing" he said while looking at Ellie's wound. "you see some perks come with ice, I can numb the pain or slow down the bleeding with my powers" he explained to her

"that's so sick" she said impressed as the pain in her leg began to subside.

"No need to thank me just doing my job" he said while bowing.

Ellie went to sleep after chatting for a few more minutes with her new friend. After a few more days of traveling Joel said they finally reached Bills town. They went down the road while exploring the shops and houses for any supplies. They went inside an ally where a clicker popped into view. It charged at them, exploding when it crossed a trip wire exploding into a pile of shrapnel.

"HOLY CRAP THAT WAS AWESOME" Zaroff said.

"what was that?" Ellie asked

"that was one of Bill's traps" Joel said.

One of them! meaning there's more? Ellie thought to herself. they kept moving ahead and when Joel had opened a door only to get snared up in a trap.

"cut me down from here, that fridge looks like the counterweight cut it off" Joel said

"aye aye don Capitan" Zaroff said.

Ellie and zaroff began to cut off the rope on the fridge when Joel saw something moving by the fence,

"INFECTED LOOK OUT" he shouted as bunch of infected climbed over the fence.

They charged the garage they were in while Zaroff and Joel drew their weapons.

"Cut faster Ellie" she thought to her self while Zaroff and Joel were fighting for each others lives.

Soon the rope snapped and Joel hit the floor disoriented and pinned by a runner. Soon a machete lodged itself in the runners skull where a masked man yelled for everyone to start running. Soon they all reached what appeared to be a safe house, while we were catching our breath the masked man got a pair of handcuffs and latched Ellie to a pipe and was about to get another set for Zaroff before Ellie pulled off the pipe and began to hit the man with it.

"Ellie stop it" Joel said holding the pipe away from Ellie.

"What are you doing here Joel?" the masked man asked

"Bill I'm here to cash in on that favor you owe me" Joel said.

"I owe you nothing" Bill said

"Bill listen it's important, I need a car"

"you hearing this guy, like my routines are less important but Joel needs a car, yeah, why not take all my food too" he said

"yeah well by the looks of it you need to lose some of that food" Ellie said

"shut up" Bill replied

"FUCK YOU you handcuffed me!" she exclaimed.

"Who's this ray of sunshine he hasn't said anything yet, hey you need something too like a brand new fucking TV or something" he said to Zaroff.

Fuck this guy Ellie thought, and Joel trusts him?

"names Zaroff and a car would be fine" he said calmly.

"hah definitely more level-headed then that little turd over there" he said directing at Ellie

"fuck you" she responded.

"stop arguing are you going to help or not?" Joel asked

"I have parts, only thing I'm missing is the battery and luckily enough a truck just so happened to crash into the school over there, battery and all" Bill said

"so that's where were heading?" Joel asked

"yep get your things and we can head to my armory" Bill said.

"can I get a gun?" Ellie asked

"no" Joel answered

"what why?" she exclaimed

"the answer is no you have your knife" he said

"what about me I don't have any weapons" Zaroff said.

Ellie was MAD when she saw Joel give him a gun. Just as Ellie was about to speak in protest Zaroff stopped her and said

"here take it, but don't tell Joel okay, I had to pretend I have no super powers and he knew as well cause I really don't want this guy knowing what I can do" Zaroff explained then gave the handgun to Ellie.

She smiled at him and soon they made their way to the armory.

**AUTHORS NOTE: IF ANY OF YOU HAVENT FIGURED HOW THE POINT OF VIEW CHANGES WORK ITS LIKE THIS. TWO CHAPTERS FOR ZAROFF, ONE FOR JOEL, ONE FOR ELLIE, THEN TWO MORE FOR ZAROFF. ZAROFF BEING THE MAIN CHARACHTER I FEEL HE NEEDS MORE SCREENTIME**


	5. The School

We went across the street when I noticed a lot of infected down the road. I motioned for Joel to get down so we can sneak past them I can't have that Bill fellow know I can control ice, we managed to sneak past them and get through a locked gate and got inside the armory. When we entered Bill's armory first thing I saw was a mountain of comic books, Ellie began to search through them to find an interesting read.

"HEY NO TOUCHING" I heard Bill yell

"I'm just organizing your fucking trashy pile" Ellie responded.

I wandered around the area ignoring the conversation between Joel and Bill until I saw Bill give Joel an item that looked like it was a torture device. I wanted one was the only thing I could think of. Out of the corner of my eye I noticed Ellie steal a comic book from Bills pile, she saw me and I simply pretended like I never saw her. Joel found a workbench and began to modify his weapons and such while Bill was sharpening his machete. I decide to use the opportunity to steal one of those death cans. When I picked one up it didn't have the nails but it was filled to the brim with explosives. While no one was looking I used my ice shards to replace the shrapnel with a new kick in it.

Lets just say it will be a cold day in hell when this thing goes off. We went upstairs to what looked like a church

"well I guess if we need to confess sins now would be the time to do it" I said

"Yeah and I bet his is handcuffing little girls" she said trying to make herself look like a victim

"ten hail Mary's!" I exclaimed.

We both started to laugh until we saw the two leaving through a window to what looked like, guess what, A GRAVEYARD.

"From here on out is uncharted territory to me so be careful" said Bill

"aye aye sergeant fat ass" Ellie said.

He just ignored her and we began to wander in the graveyard, not spooky at all. We saw some infected but we took em downtown, dear god that sounded dreadful! When we left the graveyard we entered an abandoned neighborhood, perfect! this place was filled with infected we could only sneak past them, Then the worst thing you could do in this situation happened. I sneezed, moment I did we all just started running like hell itself was coming for us. Hey mabey it was in the pile of infected running at us? Joel threw his new toy at the crowd clearing it almost entirely except for a runner or two. Bill shot the rest,

"well that couldn't have gone any better" Joel said catching his breath

"yeah well lets keep moving now that its clear" said Bill.

we continued down the road till we reached the school, surrounding it were more infected about my age. meaning they were practically at their peak when it came to strength and speed! We had to clear it so we made a plan, me and Ellie would be a distraction team while they cleared it from behind. When Bill and Joel were behind the pack we started to make a lot of noise, I will admit I felt more like a kid again just screaming and bashing stuff around, it would've been enjoyable if there weren't hungry infected running for us.

One tackled me immediately, I took the blow and lifted it up by its neck and threw it to the ground crushing its head with my foot. Before any more could reach us Joel and Bill killed them. we saw that The path was blocked by a bus, Joel gave a foot lift to Ellie and she dropped a ladder down. The noise she made while doing it could wake the dead, it did just that too! The entire town was now coming for us and we had to find a way in and quickly. When I came on top of the bus I kicked the ladder down, like it mattered anyway they will just climb over the barbed wire anyway.

We found a window and soon opened it, there was a clicker inches away from biting Joel before the window closed on its face.

"Holy crap that was intense" said Ellie catching her breath.

"FUCK" we heard Bill exclaim, "Someone nabbed the battery before we did" he said closing the trucks engine hood. We continued through the infected riddled hallways till we reached what looked like a gymnasium. Moment we entered some double doors burst open revealing the most ugly motherfucker ever to set foot on this good green earth.

"WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT?!" exclaimed Ellie,

"ITS A BLOATER GET DOWN" exclaimed Joel.

They started to shoot at it but its fungal plates acted as fucking armor and it bounced the bullets right of it. I decided to try something, brute vs brute, I began to channel all of my energy to encase my arms in ice. Kinda like rock hard muscles except made of hard ice, still unbreakable and just as painful. Ellie saw what I was doing as the ice around my arms grew to about 5 inches thick. I walked towards the thing while they were still shooting at it. The thing knew I was coming and I swear it was looking into my SOUL. Bill and Joel's expressions were something to see for sure.

I punched the Bloater in the chest causing it to stumble back a few feet. It charged me and grabbed me by my head, it was attempting to break my skull! I encased my head in ice severing a few of its fingers and letting me go. I grabbed its arm and slowly it became brittle and then I broke it like a twig. The Bloater was shrieking in pain when I did the same to its head, to put this in perspective I just ripped off the head of something equivalent to a tank!

The room was staring at me as my arms slowly regained their skinny nature.

"what the fuck are you?" Bill said

"lets just say the devil tips his hat to me" I said

"Bill I'll explain later for now let's get the fuck out of here" Joel said

we left through the gyms window and climbed over a fence to a nearby house

"now what?" Joel asked

"oh no you can't possibly be expecting me to" he cut himself off when he saw what was hanging in front of him no pun intended

"you know this guy?" Joel asked

"yes he was an old partner of mine" Bill said.

Ellie went into the garage and we heard her talking from the room

"guys you want to see this".

When we entered inside we saw that the truck inside the garage had a battery!

"son of a bitch nabbed it before us!" Bill exclaimed

"can it drive?" asked Joel

"yeah just let me fix it up a bit and we will be on the way" Bill said.

After a few minutes the truck was ready to go, it was decided me and Ellie would be in the truck while Joel and Bill pushed it. I will be covering them from inside the truck while Ellie keeps her foot on the accelerator.

"I don't think its fair" I said to Ellie

"what is it?" she asked

"your fourteen years old and you already get to drive and I'm fifteen and I don't even get to take lessons" I said,

she laughed a bit and soon we were pushed outside the quite streets. While we were being pushed we heard infected coming out onto the streets. I made a mission to kill all the clickers and let them handle the runners. Soon we started to go down hill where Ellie set her foot on the accelerator. We both started cheering when we heard the engine come to life. When Joel and bill jumped onto the truck we started heading to any direction, just away from here.

We dropped Bill off with a few words exchanged between him and Joel. Soon we were sitting in the car in silence while Ellie read the comic books she stole from Bill.

"Oh man" she exclaimed startling me and Joel with the sudden noise

"hey what happened to sleeping?" Joel asked.

"Okay I know it may not look it but this is a pretty good read, there is one problem, right there to be continued" she explained holding open the last page of the comic.

"what else did you get?" Joel asked

"well I got this, make you feel nostalgic?" she said pulling out a cassette

"I will have you know this is actually before my time, still a winner though" Joel said while putting it in the slot.

The car filled with the sound of country music.

"Oh and I'm sure your friend will be missing these tonight" she said while pulling out a magazine of... men in G-strings!

"okay then to hot for this car" I said while opening a window

"uh Ellie that aint ment for kids" Joel said

"light on the reading but it has some interesting photos" she said while skimming the pages. "WHOAH how the hell does he walk around with that thing"? she exclaimed

"Ellie give me that" Joel said trying to snatch the magazine.

"hold your horses I want to see what all the fuss is about" she said holding it away from him.

Thirsty, whats that? you need a flood for that kind of stuff.

"oh? why are these all stuck together?" she asked,

we all looked at her with awkward eyes. she started to chuckle

"I'm just fucking with you guys" she said while throwing the magazine out the window.

"imagine if a scavenger is just wondering and finds that magazine" I said,

Joel chuckled while Ellie laughed like a mad person at the thought.

"Why don't you guys get some sleep?" asked Joel

"no way I'm not even tired" said Ellie.

Not even two minutes later she fall fast asleep. The coolness of my body makes sleep restless, just a job really so I didn't get much shut eye. We continued to Pittsburg in a nice warm car.


	6. The Hunters Den

Me and Ellie awoke a few hours later, it was still day. After a about a few minutes of driving we saw a man in the middle of the street asking for help with what looked like blood on his shirt.

"I've seen this trick before" I said

"what? we have to help him" said Ellie

"he aint even hurt" Joel said readying the accelerator.

We rushed the man with a speeding truck when he exclaimed

"SHIT GO GO" after that we were ambushed by a group of people.

We ran over the man

"ROADKILL" I exclaimed,

When we continued straight we saw a fucking bus about to ram us. The bus made contact with the truck causing us to crash into the convenient store in front of us. We were dazed and confused as the men made their approach. They opened the door on both sides and pulled me and Ellie out of the vehicle. I pulled out of the mans reach and punched him in the face. He moved back stunned and I jumped on him where I began to punch him out. He passed out after the first couple of hits, when I stood up I saw Joel kick a guy who was choking out Ellie and smash his head against a counter. I heard more of them coming when I decided to try stretch my powers and try something new.

I stood out in the open and waited for them to start shooting at me. Bear with me I know it sounds stupid but wait. Being a conduit my reflexes are a lot faster and when I heard the first shot to my left I created a shield of frost or rather extremely cold dry ice. So cold it stopped the bullet heading towards me and it dropped to the ground completely useless. I heard more shots and I moved the shield in that direction with the same reaction.

I popped my neck and decided now is the best time to practice with my powers. I created a ball of unstable ice in my hand which will explode on contact and freeze anything in its vicinity. I threw it in the direction with the most shooting and saw as Joel and Ellie's eyes went wide with shock as the hunters turned into popsicles.

"I have two choices for you guys, give up or die" I said trying to sound like they had no chance.

I saw a hunter come out of the corner with a pistol raised at me. He shot but my shield stopped his bullet, I froze him in his spot not a second afterward.

"Wow great job snowman" said Ellie,

we continued through hunter territory when I heard Ellie blowing out air

"what are you doing?" asked Joel

"I'm trying to whistle" Ellie said.

I decided to teach her but first to show her the true power of the whistle. I started to whistle from the lowest note to the highest and back and threw in a few random notes in it. She punched me in the arm saying

"show off".

We continued till we reached what looked like a flooded street, we saw a few hunters going into the hotel and taking with them a board to cross the collapsed coffee shop to the truck leading into a broken window.

"why does everything need to be flooded?" asked Ellie by the cruel humor nature has thrown at her.

We found board she used to get into the coffee shop and found a plank to cross to the truck. As we were entering the building Ellie asked

"what do you think my powers would be if I had that gene you were talking about?" she asked

"I see you as a fire or mabey air, who knows mabey you do have the conduit gene and you just don't know it yet" I said.

"Boy I sure hope so" she said

"Just what I need TWO freaks" Joel said

"you love us" I said teasingly.

When we entered the building we found a ladder leading upstairs. When we got to the next floor Ellie pulled out a book from her backpack

"What did the cannibal get when he got to the party late?" she said to me and Joel reading off the book

"what?" I asked

"the cold shoulder" she said with a solemn smile

I chuckled a little "okay here's one, prepare people have been known to DIE laughing from this joke, What has more lives than a cat?" I asked

"what?" she asked

"a frog! it croaks every night" I finished,

awkward silence filled the room

"lets keep moving" I said defeated.

we entered the hallways when we heard more hunters talking. We cleared them out with ease and continued till we saw an elevator. We crossed to the second elevator next to it, me and Ellie climbed on to the floor but when Joel was about to get on the thing started to creak. It fell down to the basement of the hotel "

ARE YOU OKAY?" asked Ellie

"I'M FINE" replied Joel

"WERE COMING DOWN" she said back

"NO STAY UP THERE I CAN FIND A WAY BACK UP" he said the left.

We continued down the corridors of the hotel speaking silently

"so you really think I have the conduit gene?" she asked.

"Of course I mean you certainly act like it" I said

"hey what does that mean?" she asked slightly mad

"nothing" I said.

We continued our chat about what would it be like if she was a conduit, she said she would like to control light. We continued down the halls when we reached what looked like the dining area. We saw dead hunters then we heard a splash and the sound of a man jumping down from a ledge. When we came to the source of the sound we saw a man holding Joel's head under some water. Ellie drew the gun I gave her and shot the man. When Joel came up for air he saw Ellie holding the gun and said

"where the hell did you get that?"

"what? that's the first thing you say no, thank you for saving me Ellie!"

"I'm thankful I didn't get my head blown off by a goddamn kid!" he exclaimed.

she was furious when Joel took the gun away from her.

"Look Joel don't be mad at her she saved your life after all and I was the one who gave her the gun" I admitted

"why?" he asked

"because what would happen if you two got separated and she had met a guy with a fucking shotgun when she is 2 meters away and clearly out ranged with her knife" I said.

He shrugged off my remark clearly stating I won the argument since he didn't have anything to say back. We made it to a scaffolding where we saw more hunters on the streets and a rifle just sitting against the roof. Joel thought for a moment and decided to give Ellie the rifle

"you know how to shoot one?" he asked her

"I shot rats with BB guns before" she said

"well it's kinda the same thing you cover me from here and you do the same" he said to me and Ellie.

He jumped down and together we began to clean house. It was awesome to say the least Joel was a walking tank while me and Ellie were sniping people from the roof tops. When we finally cleared the area Joel gave Ellie the handgun he took.

"Only use this in emergencies" he said

"I wont let you down" she said.

We were now on the streets of the hunters lair, we entered a building nearby when we saw something terrifying. We saw an army truck rolling up killing some random people, this thing had a fucking mounted machine gun. I may have the ability to stop bullets but that thing can punch through steel like paper! we had an entirely new problem now and we still had a long way to go.


	7. Belly Of The Beast

When Joel saw the truck he knew things would be even more difficult than ever. The kid may be able to help against it but nothing can survive that thing. The truck left and they continued down the streets only to meet more hunters.

"Hopefully the noise wont attract it" he said to himself while he was planning his surprise attack against the hunters inside the nearby building.

He saw Zaroff going inside the building and he followed after him with Ellie behind him. Zaroff cleared the building too make sure there were no extra eyes to spot them. They continued down the streets till they saw an emergency ladder leading to the roof of a small building,

"I'll be waiting for you" Zaroff said before flying to the roof.

Joel gave a lift to Ellie who dropped down the ladder. When they reached the top of the roof they went down into another street that was blocked off by a quarantine wall. When they went inside a building they heard the engine of the army truck.

"Crap!" said Joel crouching,

Joel led around the building and realized their next problem, they have to cross the street to get past it! Zaroff said he will distract the truck while they ran to the buildings across from them. Joel was proven wrong before why question him now? Zaroff went into the open street letting the truck see him, the truck opened fire immediatly but Zaroff propeled the truck upwards by summoning a pillar of ice below it sending it flying across the air to the other side of the street.

"Holy shit" said Ellie amazed that he just propelled the truck sky-high.

The truck landed on its side and wont be getting up unless someone pushed it back into place. They ran for the buildings next to them and climbed up the apartment buildings. When Zaroff entered the room he was attacked by a middle-aged black man. Zaroff knocked him off by elbowing him in the gut and when Joel put a gun to his head Ellie stopped them both when they saw a kid holding a gun to them all. Joel put down his gun and Zaroff raised his hands up,

"put down the gun kid" said Joel

"its okay sam put it down" said the man who attacked Zaroff.

" Names Henry thats my brother Sam" he said

"wait why did you tell him to put down the gun?" asked Joel

"you see those hunters out there, they don't exactly take kids with them" he said pointing to Ellie and Zaroff.

"So why are you here then?" asked Ellie.

"Well you see me and my group were separated here, before that we had made a plan to meet by the radio tower past here" Henry said

"where were you going?" she asked again

"we're going to join the fireflies" Henry said

"small world us too" said Joel.

Joel discussed a plan with Henry when they came to the conclusion to escape at night when they were at a skeleton crew. They left later that night in the cover if darkness. When they had breached the inside with some resistance they found a truck with a broken ladder. Joel gave Ellie a foot lift and Henry who picked up Sam, Zaroff jumped onto the truck with his "fancy super powers" as Joel called it. As henry was about to lift Joel up they saw the walls being pushed back by something big! Henry dropped Joel and began to run with Sam behind him.

Joel couldn't believe it they just left them to die!

"not leaving you behind" said Ellie as she jumped down with Zaroff behind her.

Zaroff lifted open a garage door with some ice and they began to run as the truck from earlier made its way through the walls. Soon their running led them to a bridge that was broken with the truck slowly closing in on them.

"We have to jump" said Ellie

"What! but you can't swim!" exclaimed Joel

"there is no other way" she said

"fuck this" said Zaroff.

He pushed both of them off the bridge then leapt after them. When they were about to hit the water he encased all of them in a hollow ball of ice. When they hit the water they never noticed that it was warm and was beginning to eat at the ice

"holy shit that was cool" said Ellie.

They only noticed that the ice was thinning when they could see through it, and they saw a protruding rock and they were heading straight for it.

"Crap, Ellie grab Joel and don't let go for anything!" exclaimed Zaroff,

when they hit the rock the ice shattered and Joel continued to hit the rock at the pace they were moving in causing him to black out. When he awoke he found him self on the sand. He saw Ellie and Zaroff approaching him with Henry and Sam behind them. Joel got up pulled a gun on Henry

"whoa! Joel calm down" said Ellie.

"This son of a bitch left us to die!" exclaimed Joel

"let me explain Joel" said Henry "I had to protect Sam if you were in my place you would've done the same thing" he said.

Joel lowered the gun

"and Sam saw us floating in the water if it wasn't for him we would've drowned" Ellie said.

"fine where to now?" asked Joel

"follow me" said Henry.

Joel noticed that all the kids were talking, he couldn't help but smile at the fact that they seemed to find time to act like kids in a world like this. Soon they found the entrance to a sewer system, Henry and Joel opened the entrance and the kids crawled through then Joel and Henry. As they ventured they soon found infected inside the place. When they opened a door deep into the sewers a weight system separated them from the two sides Joel Zaroff and Sam on one side, Ellie and Henry on the other.

"hang on a second I can get it open" said Zaroff,

he began to freeze the door. Sam's eyes went wide as he saw the impossible happen. When Zaroff shattered the doors they ran through as a pack of clickers made their way to them. As they were running from the now increasing infected pack they found themselves in a room with a blocked door that looked like the exit with a small opening.

"crap we have to fit them through" said Henry referring to Ellie and Sam,

Zaroff was about an inch shorter than Joel so he couldn't fit. When they were through the small opening they heard something heavy being moved.

"get behind me!" exclaimed Zaroff.

"what are you doing kid!" exclaimed Henry

"Just trust him" said Joel.

When the infected began to pour in Henry was amazed to see Zaroff turn the infected into blocks of ice one by one. When Ellie and Sam finally opened the door they were completely shocked to see the entire room look like a meat freezer.

"What is that kid?" asked Henry,

Zaroff explained himself to Henry and Sam

"so you mean to say were traveling now with a kid who can control the elements?" asked Henry

"pretty much but he's not bad, just a jerk" answered Ellie.

They continued down the streets while Sam and Henry asked Zaroff more questions about his powers. then they heard a shot cross through the sky.

"Shit fucking sniper" said Henry

"I'll take him out you guys distract him" said Joel

"here take this" said Zaroff making what looked like a shield made of ice

"this will help?" asked Joel

"its denser than steel" said Zaroff.

Joel made his way through the building until he reached the snipers den. He killed the sniper and soon started to help the others through the streets by taking out any hunters unlucky enough to wander into his sights. Soon he saw the truck from earlier making its way across the street. The thing was bullet proof so no sniper round will make it in, until he saw the latch open and a hand throw a Molotov at them. The Molotov missed the others and he saw a body emerge from the latch to get a better view. He shot the man and now the Molotov in his hand crashed inside the truck burning everyone inside to a crisp. Everyone else emerged from cover relieved. Then clickers attacked them, Zaroff froze them both and soon they alerted a town of infected. Joel saw there were too many to fight so their only option was to escape. They all escaped through a small opening in the fence and found their way to the radio tower. When they arrived Joel was happy to see the place stocked with supplies.

They all ate like kings and a queen that night. When Ellie entered the room Sam was in she saw him and Zaroff talking.

"No joke I just pointed my finger and said BANG and the guy just started running and screaming" she heard Zaroff say

"ha-ha no way!" said Sam

"I can see you two have bonded, so what are you doing?" she said entering the room

"taking stock" said Sam

"so how are we doing on, canned peaches?" she asked

"did Henry send you?" Sam asked

"no why would he?" she asked

"to make sure I'm not screwing anything up" he said

"come on you're doing good" said Zaroff

Sam was silent for a moment then said "why are you never afraid?".

"Who says were not?" Ellie said

"then what are you afraid of?" Sam asked.

"Scorpions are pretty creepy" Ellie said, clearly it wasn't what he was looking for "I'm afraid of being by myself, I'm afraid of ending up alone" she said

Sam looked over to Zaroff "I'm afraid of making a decisions, I never want to make the choice between me and someone else, you?" he said

"I'm afraid of those things out there, I'm scared of ending up like them" he said

Zaroff perked up all of a sudden pulling out his backpack

"over all this sad talk I completely forgot I was saving this for a rainy day" he said while pulling out what looked like... SODA!

Ellie and Sam couldn't believe it they had never seen a soda can before let alone drink it.

"I found this stuff a few days ago back in Bills stash and because my body temperature is always cold they'll always stay fresh" he said while handing one to Ellie and Sam and getting one for himself, he held up his can

"to friends, cheers" he said

"cheers" said Ellie

"cheers" said Sam

they clinked their soda cans together and started to drink them. Ellie loved the taste it was so tangy and sweet.

"holy crap this is good shit" Ellie said

"yeah thanks" said Sam.

They began to talk and laugh more together but soon the sugar rush ran out. With it coming the infamous sugar crash, Ellie and Zaroff left and didn't notice that Sam wasn't following them out the door. When Ellie awoke the next morning she saw that Henry was cooking something

"Smells good" she said

"thanks" Henry said

"where's Sam?" she asked

"I let him sleep in for once if you want him to join go wake his ass up" Henry said.

When Ellie entered Sam's room she saw that he wasn't looking to well. At first she thought maybe it was from the soda, it was her first time drinking some she had no idea what are the consequences. she screamed when Sam lunged for her pushing back the door making her fall on her back, she heard Joel going for his gun and then She heard a gunshot. She expected Sam to go limp but saw that he didn't then she heard Henry scream

"THATS MY FUCKING BROTHER".

She continued to struggle against her attacker when she heard Zaroff coming up and kicking Sam off her. He then froze Sam in place and he began to struggle. after a few seconds of nothing they heard Henry shoot Sam in the head. He began to cry and then he pointed the gun at Joel.

"This is your fault" He said

"Henry this is no ones fault" Joel said trying to calm him down

"ITS ALL YOUR FAULT" Henry screamed.

He then pointed the gun at his head and pulled the trigger. After a moment of silence they all left the radio tower after burying Sam and Henry.

"this shouldn't have happened" said Zaroff

"there was nothing we could do" said Joel.

"That's not true" said Ellie

They continued through the now freezing rain to find Joel's brother in this world of pain and misery.


	8. Reunion

A few more days of traveling led everyone to what appeared to be a water-mill.

"Great more water I can't swim in" thought Ellie,

Zaroff having the conduit gene was able to swim to the other side and create a path for Ellie to walk across. Ellie couldn't help but think how awesome his powers are, it was like she was best friends with a god. They continued farther when they reached a gate when Joel tried to open it Ellie drew her gun when she saw multiple people emerge from cover and draw rifles. They heard a woman yell at them

"tell the girl to drop her weapon now!" she exclaimed

"Ellie do as she says" Joel said

"why are you here?" she said

"we didn't know the place was occupied"

he was cut off by another mans voice

"let them in they're good"

"what you know them?" said the woman

"I know him, he's my goddamn brother" said the man who was a little shorter than Joel.

After the family reunion Ellie was introduced to Maria or Joel's sister-in-law and Tommy, Joel's little brother. When they had entered Ellie was excited to see horses inside

"can I pet it?" she asked

"of course" said Maria

"so who are the younglings? they siblings?" asked Tommy

"that's what I need to talk to you about tommy" said Joel.

When Joel left with Tommy Maria asked Ellie a few questions

"you ever rode a horse before?" she asked

"yeah I have actually a soldier named Winston back in the zone gave me lessons" she explained... she missed him.

Maria turned over to Zaroff

"so how did you join them?" she asked

"long story short I was lost and I found them" Zaroff explained.

They went to get some food and while they were eating Ellie was talking to Maria when she brought up Joel's daughter Sarah who died when the infection started, she was silent then she noticed Zaroff barely touched his food

"what's wrong?" asked Maria

"nothing I'm just not hungry and I'd hate to waste perfectly good food" he said

"okay well you don't have to eat it we can always give it to someone else" she said.

After a few more minutes of talking Ellie thought that this place was paradise but why does Zaroff seem so distant? Then they heard gunshots

"shit bandits!" Maria exclaimed.

She led them inside the building but soon the bandits broke in.

"Shit get behind me" said Maria

"let me handle this" said Zaroff

"what? no you wont survive a second out there" she said

"just watch him" said Ellie with a huge ass grin on her face.

Zaroff stood out of cover and made the finger guns at the bandits who saw him

"get back" he said while pointing the finger gun.

The bandits just looked at him then started to laugh

"do you see this fuckwit?" said one

"yeah? and what will you do?" the bandit said.

Ellie couldn't help but watch as Zaroff said BANG and the first bandit collapsed on the floor as a piece of ice was lodged in his side. The other bandit started to freak out

"back off or I will kill you with my mind!" he said.

the bandit aimed his shotgun but couldn't pull the trigger when all of a sudden his finger was frozen in place. Ellie looked with a weird mix of pleasure kinda like watching a brawl it's just fun to watch! Zaroff pointed his finger gun again and said BANG sending another piece of ice into the guys head. Ellie looked over to Maria and her face was just like everyone elses when they see a kid take out a thing twice his size, shock.

when Zaroff walked back he said "problem solved, now what?"

"what did you just do?" Maria asked with fear and shock

"Ellie do you mind explaining this to her?" he asked.

After everything was clear and the bandits retreated she explained Zaroff's powers and abilities to Maria. After Maria finally accepted what Ellie said as truth she turned the spotlight to Zaroff asking him an assortment of questions. After her curiosity was quenched she found Tommy again Ellie ran over to Joel with Zaroff at her side. Tommy was talking to Maria about how he needs to take Ellie to the fireflies with Maria protesting.

"Does that have anything to do with me?" Ellie asked

"we'll talk about it later" Joel replied

"did he tell you where the lab is?" she asked

"we'll talk about it later" he said

"later... right" she said, she got the feeling Joel was going to leave her with tommy and she got mad then she walked off taking Zaroff with her believing he was the only person she could rely on anymore. She rode of with one of the horses with Zaroff running along side her.

They reached an abandoned home where she simply sat by an upstairs windowsill while Zaroff contemplated what just happened.

"Do you think its fair that Joel is just going to leave us with Tommy?" she asked Zaroff

"I suppose not but you have to remember he's thinking more about himself here he's making sure humanity's last hope is in safer hands" he said

"so that's how he sees me a vial with a cure but not as a person?" she said agitated

"no I meant that he want to make sure you stay safe he cares about your safety" he said

"then why do I feel more scared than safe?" Ellie asked,

Zaroff had a point but she feels betrayed that Joel is just going to dump her on someone like she was just cargo from the start. Joel and Tommy arrived soon to the house, when Joel entered the room he saw both kids sitting in silence. Ellie began to argue with Joel when Zaroff dropped a bomb

"is it because she reminds you of Sarah?" he said

"what the fuck did you just say?" Joel said

"if your reminded of Sarah because of her and that's why you want to get rid of her than that's a pretty crappy reason" he said agitating Joel

"you are treading on VERY thin ice"

"well were both sorry for your loss but we've lost people too" Zaroff said

"you know nothing about loss" Joel said

"FUCK OFF Joel you met us on a whim you know nothing about our lives before so you don't have the right to fucking judge us, she may not be your daughter but that doesn't mean its a good reason to get rid of her" he said

Ellie couldn't believe what she was hearing at this point she felt scared that Zaroff was going to walk out on both of them.

"Your right about one thing, she is not my daughter and I'm not her dad" he said with resent.

Tommy burst in saying bandits have broken in. They managed to escape the house with it looking like a snow fort and now were heading back to Tommy's home.

"where is this lab anyway?" asked Joel

"all the way out in eastern Colorado" answered Tommy

"go Big Horns, Ellie get off your horse give it back to Tommy" asked Joel.

After Ellie gave him back the horse confused she saw Joel motion for her to get on the his horse she climbed on Joel's horse while Zaroff stayed walking, he can't ride the horse or it would freeze.

"how do I find this lab?" Joel asked

"it looks like a giant mirror you can't miss it, look lets head back to town and discuss it" said Tommy

"you know me, my minds made up" said Joel "adios little brother" Joel said to his brother.

they then rode off towards the Colorado university with Zaroff keeping pace with the trotting horse Ellie feeling relieved no one was leaving today.


	9. Collage Years

As we entered the university I found it unfair I couldn't ride the horse. I can freeze the thing yeah but that still doesn't make it fair I can keep up with the thing when it's trotting but it's still tiring even for a conduit. Joel got of the horse when we were next to a dormitory and said

"stay here and watch Callus, ugh what kind of name is that anyway?"

"not my fault you forgot to ask Tommy his name" said Ellie

"Callus" Joel said unamused by the name of the horse.

while he was gone Ellie started to chat with me

"you still have some soda left?" she asked.

I started to check my backpack

"yeah just one more you can have it if you want but how about when we finish this quest of ours" I said

"okay itll make me more motivated at least" said Ellie.

When Joel came back we continued to the center grounds and we saw monkeys.

"aw are those monkeys?" Ellie asked

"yep a full group of them it seems" said Joel.

The monkeys ran off when we got closer, we continued to the center grounds and we saw a locked gate that is activated by a generator. W followed the wire that led to it which led to another building. Joel activated the generator and soon we saw the giant mirror building Tommy was talking about and made our way to it. While rummaging through my backpack I saw the old death can I left in there

"One day" I whispered to it.

When we entered the building I noticed one thing it was silent I was used to the sound of bugs and birds but now there was no sound at al like time was at a standstill it was unnerving. The place also looked trashed like a bunch of bulls had run through here. We climbed up the stairs while the silence hung over like a bad omen. When we reached the top floor we heard clanging. Joel drew his gun and we cautiously continued further.

When we reached the room we saw infected monkeys and they instinctively ran from our sheer size. we saw a dead body with a bullet wound in its head and next to it was a tape recorder. Joel turned it on and after a few minutes of nonsense we found out the fireflies packed up and left and that their next base was in salt lake city.

"Is that far?" asked Ellie

"well it aint exactly close" said Joel

"guys there are people outside" I said.

We looked outside and saw a small group of people wandering the university grounds

"fireflies?" Ellie said.

Then we heard a gunshot ring through the window and whiz past my head. We took that as our cue to leave but what we didn't notice was that they were already inside the building. Joel managed to take them out with me and Ellie and when he crossed through the inside balcony he opened the door to a big guy ready to tackle him. He was pushed to the side railing, Me and Ellie ran for him but he knocked the guy off and he fell of the side where the most terrifying thing happened! He landed on a piece of rebar!

He screamed in pain me and Ellie came down to help him. I had no idea what was going to happen at this point if Joel dies were as good as dead. Some more bandits burst through the door but Joel took em down. I thought for a second then said

"Ellie pull him up I can stop the bleeding, at the very least I can buy him some time remember your leg wound?"

"right! Joel get ready to push in three..two..one".

When she started to pull him off he screamed in pain and when he was on one leg I started to work my magic. I managed to numb the pain and stop the bleeding but even with that he was still pouring blood. I probably bought him an extra five minutes till he blacks out. We continued through the building with a gravely wounded Joel and when we vaulted a window cill he collapsed.

I went to open the door for him, moment I did I was met with a shotgun aiming at my stomach. I may have fast reflexes but I was not expecting that and when the trigger pulled the force or the blast launched me towards the nearest desk. If it wasn't for the fact I was a conduit I would've died instantly. Ellie killed him or I think she did? When I tried to get up I was terrified to see I didn't have the strength to move my legs!

Ellie ran over to my side and she began to cry

"get up man I thought you were god or something please get up" tears were streaking down her face when she realized she may end up all alone in this cruel world.

I began strain in an attempt to get up, doing so caused me to cough up blood as I spoke

"you gotta leave me, even if my body can heal the wounds the pellets are shredding up my insides" I began to breathe heavily "just prop me up against the wall or something" I coughed out

"NO YOUR GOING TO MAKE IT, YOU AND JOEL SO PLEASE GET UP!" she was screaming

"I never thought I'd go out like this, swallowing dynamite maybe but a shotgun, never saw that coming" I said trying to get her to smile one more time.

she propped me up against the wall

"one more thing Ellie" I coughed

"what?" she said hoping she can do something to save me

"my names not Zaroff it's Tony' I said.

She started to cry again

"please don't go Tony!" she said

"just take Joel and go... leave me".

With heavy reluctancy she did something I have'nt felt in seven years... a hug. My powers were weakening and my body temperature was rising to that of a normal body. she picked up Joel and started to leave me to my thoughts I looked at the wound and saw eight holes in my lower abdomen all of them bleeding a lot. I smiled then I began to sing

"I see... your star.. you left it burning for me...mother, I'm here"

Ellie continued farther crying for the first in a long time. If Joel didn't pull through she would be all alone. They continued through the building the exit seeming miles away as Joel became weaker every second. When they reached the entrance some more bandits attacked them. Ellie killed them both and she began to move for the door with Joel leaning on her.

When she opened the door to the stairway Joel fell down the steps and collapsed next to a man trying to steal Callus, she shot him and tried to get Joel on top of Callus. He had barely managed to balance himself but they didn't even get two meters and he fell off the horse.

"No Joel get up, you gotta tell me what to do!" she exclaimed

as she was struggling to get him up she noticed a dark figure moving towards her. She raised her gun at it and she was so happy to see Zaroff .. Tony limping towards them. She ran over to embrace him but stopped halfway when he collapsed on the cold ground seemingly unmoving. Ellie was broken at that point she had no idea what to do anymore. Soon night began to settle on the university and with it the first snowfall of the winter months.


	10. Survival

Ellie was left in the cold and snow with the bodies of the people she cared about. She had to think otherwise they would both die. If Tony had the strength to walk out the building he can surely hold on a little longer. The best course of action in her mind was to find somewhere warm and safe for them to rest. There was no way in hell she could carry them both so she thought of another plan. She went inside the dormitory and pulled out two sheets. She rolled Tony on his back and placed the sheet under him, same with Joel. She got some rope and tied in to Callus's saddle so he could drag them along as she rode.

After hours of riding she finally found a safe place to set up and went inside with the two still on the sheets. Once inside she started a fire and set them both near it. She felt their pulses, Joel's was stronger than Tony's because of his help with Joel's bleeding. Tony's pulse was very faint but it was still their. The only problem was that the pellets were still inside of Tony's body. He has no chance of surviving if those pellets are still in there, she had to find a way to get rid of them and she wasn't a surgeon. She bandaged up Joel's wound and she looked for something to help remove the pellets inside of Tony. The only thing she could find was a small knife and pliers.

She had no experience with this, the only person who did was Joel, she saw him pull tons of bullets out of his body. First thing to do is to stop the bleeding. She pulled a small medkit and started to clean up Tony's wounds. She felt scared when he barely reacted to the alcohol with only a small flinch.

"Not a good sign" she said to herself,

if he wasn't reacting than he was more gone than she thought. Even with the bleeding stopped there was still the issue with the pellets. Now that the wound was clean she could see all the entrances of the pellets the only thing that scared her was what if the ammo was specialized? What if it was shatter shots they shatter once inside and Cause more wounds, or worse! piranha shot. She's seen those things in action it was like a regular shotgun pellet except not in the shape of a small ball but instead dozens of tiny razor-sharp tacks. She decided that the only way to save him was to work with what she had and use the knife she got. The knife she found inside the kitchen was a lot cleaner then her switch blade so no switch blade.

She made an incision large enough for the pliers to fit through but small enough so no bleeding can happen. Everything was going smoothly except for one thing, she had no idea what she was doing. When she pulled out the first pellet she was relieved to see it was a standard pellet and not specialized. she continued this for who knows how many hours to make sure she didn't cause any more injuries than there already was. After she was finished she bandaged him up and saw her finished results. Eight pellets extracted, and Tony was starting to regain some color.

"Not bad for a little kid" she thought to herself.

Now the next step was food and water. It was snowing like crazy so water isn't a problem the only issue was food. She found a few canned foods inside the cupboards that could last about 3 days if rationed well. She needs hunt if she plans to help them, she would start practicing tomorrow. She Slept on the floor with Joel and Tony next to the warm fire. She wasn't worried about smoke she was a good few miles away from the university so no one would be able to see it at night and the fire was going to die while she slept anyway.

When she awoke the next morning she saw that it snowed a good 3 inches. She took Joel's bow and started to practice shooting bottles outside. After she felt ready She went into the nearby woods and started to hunt after she knocked down about a hundred bottles. She had to make sure she was a crack shot, she came back after a few hours of hunting with some birds and a snow fox. Joel and Tony were awake but barely, kind of like they could drift to sleep at any second. She gutted the animals and soon they ate. Ellie had to feed Joel most of the time due to him being unable to stand up, she was worried his wound got infected with something.

Joel was barely able to stay conscious while he ate while Tony was completely unconscious after five minutes. She needed to keep them alive. They helped her survive now it was her turn to return the favor. She cared for them and come hell or high water she wasn't going to have anyone else leave her again... not again.


	11. The Devils Grin

A few days went by and Tony and Joel's strength slowly recovered however Ellie was sure their wounds were infected with something. She looked over their wounds and saw that it grew disgustingly quick and looked life it was still getting worse.

"I need to find medicine!" she thought to herself,

where though? she searched all the homes nearby and none of them have what she's looking for. All she could do was hunt and hope it cleared itself out while she was gathering food. One day while she was hunting she discovered a lone Deer, she hunted the thing down until it ran to what looked like an abandoned cabin. when she was getting ready to drag it back she met two men. She drawed her bow out and after they lowered their weapons they began to bargain for the deer. She knew what she needed so she didn't hesitate to make her demands

"MEDICINE... do you have any anti biotics?" she said

the man spoke up "get her two bottles of penicillin and a syringe" the man reluctantly left and now they were waiting for him to return.

The man was trying to gain her trust but she knew better than to trust this random revealed was named David. After a few minutes they heard infected coming through the woods

"where the hell did they come from?" she thought to herself they were literally in the middle of nowhere!

After what seemed like hours of fighting they were finally safe after an encounter with a Bloater. After they returned to the buck which was thankfully not eaten the man began to speak again

"you see I believe everything happens for a reason" he said.

"Is that true?" Ellie said

"why yes, you see this winter has been especially cruel, you see I sent a group of men to scavenge for food... they were all slaughtered by a crazy man, and get this he was traveling with a little girl and teenage boy" he said like it was nothing.

Ellie drew the rifle he gave her on David. After a few moments of silence David spoke up

"James put down the gun" he said

"what?" Ellie thought

"no way David she's killed to many of our people" she heard a man behind her say

"James put down the gun and give her the medicine" David ordered.

James reluctantly gave her the medicine and when he did she ran for Callus the at that moment. When she got back to the shelter she immediately began to go to work. She extracted some of the medicine with the syringe and injected Joel and Tony with it. She was glad to see that Tony and Joel reacted to the pain meaning they was getting better. She knew now only time could help now so she decided to sleep again with them laying next to her.

She awoke the next morning to the sound of snow crunching and men talking. When she looked outside she saw of some of David's men . She had to get them away from Joel and Tony she thought to herself. She got on Callus and began to make herself an open target to draw them away. The plan worked for a few minutes until she heard a gunshot and then began to fall down a hill. She felt scared when she saw Callus go limp and fall down with her. She had to keep moving! she went into the nearby cabin and began her escape against the hunters.

Hours went by and soon Joel woke up with a sudden start. He started to gasp for air with his sudden wake and realized where he was. When he took into the fact that Zaroff was alive he knew that Ellie had saved them both.

"God bless that girl" he thought to himself,

he heard movement outside and looked to see that hunters had found them. He looked over to Zaroff who was still asleep. He tried to shake him up with the only response being him groggily opening his eyes then closing them again. His fingers began to freeze from touching him so he decided to risk the noise. He got his gun he found at Tommy's and Held it right to Zaroff's ear. When he fired the gun away from his head the boy jumped awake like a clicker. When he looked at Joel he said

"you couldn't have just let me sleep for five more minutes?"

"nows not the time kid there are hunters outside" Joel said

"man you aint never had a friend like me" he said while getting up.

Then he noticed something, his wound was healed.

"Holy crap what happened? last time I checekd their was a hole in my stomach!" he said shocked

"thank Ellie for that but she's gone and I think our friends outside have something to do with it" Joel said.

"Okay so first off shes a probable conduit, a knife master, and now a surgeon? What is she part-time astronaut as well?".

When they made it outside they cleared the hunters out. When they were passing a houses side entrance Joel was ambushed by a hunter. He was grabbed from behind by another one while the first one drew a knife. What they weren't expecting was a cryokinetic conduit ready to open a can of whoopass! Joel felt ice begin to form behind him and then the pressure on his arms let go. He kicked the first hunter in the genitals and when he fell down Joel grabbed him and took him to the cabin they were near while Zaroff picked up the frozen one and dragged him aswell. Joel tied up the first one to a chair while the other one was shivering in a corner with his hands tied behind his back.

"Time for some information" thought Joel when he took the hunters knife from it's sheathe.


	12. Mindset

Joel mercilessly beat the man in the corner and after he stopped I saw him walk over to the man in the chair, take his knife and in one quick motion it was between the mans femur and his knee almost as if he rehearsed it before.

"AH FUCK" yelled the hunter who was surprised by the sudden pain

"focus right here" said Joel making the man look up "Tell me where the girl is or I'll pop off your goddamn kneecap" He said cold as steel,

"she's alive... she's Davids newest pet" said the man.

I didn't like what he meant by "pet".

"WHERE?" Joel exclaimed while twisting the knife making a sickening sound of turning flesh causing the man to scream in pain.

"IN THE TOWN" screamed the hunter,

Joel pulled the knife out and placed the handle of it inside the mans mouth. He spit it out immediately when Joel said to mark the map of the location of the town, I got up and said

"Joel let me try something", Ellie saved my life it was my turn to save hers.

Joel moved over and when I sat down the man started to make a weak chuckle

"a fucking kid? what can you do?" he said.

His question was quickly answered by my hand touching his thigh and soon he was getting frostbite down to the bone. he was screaming as the cold began to burn

"you have three seconds to mark the map with your finger or I will snap your leg like a fucking twig" I said holding the map up while he started to get freezer burn turning his flesh pale and brittle.

When he pointed on the map his femur bone was made completely of ice and when I untied him he stood up and we heard an unsettling crunch as his leg gave way from his weight and he collapsed to the floor screaming. Joel picked up a pipe and started to walk over to the other man

"fuck you man, he told you what you wanted, I aint telling you shit" he said

"that's alright... I believe him" Joel said calmly placing fear in his soul

"NO WAIT" he managed to say just before Joel caved in his skull with the pipe.

The other man was on the floor screaming about the fact that his leg bone was now in tiny pieces. Joel slowly walked over to him and than stomped his foot against his skull. When we got outside we had a plan, head to the place the man marked on the map and save Ellie. Me and Joel started to head in the direction he pointed to, I could have just as easily flew there but I needed Joel to help I may be a god but we had no idea what was in the town. After about an hour of walking We reached the town when a blizzard began to set in, we could barely see two inches in front of us Joel looked like his beard was going to freeze off while I simply took of the sweater I always wear because here I felt at most home, Joel didn't even question me when I did.

We wandered through the derelict town finding the bodies of other dead hunters.

"Guess shes been through here" I said examining the multiple stab wounds embedded inside the bodies. As we continued we soon got an unsettling feeling that we were too late. Then we both noticed a huge billow of smoke come from the north side of the town and as we got closer we saw what looked like a burning diner. When we entered the back entrance I nearly threw up at the sight before me. We saw hanging bodies stripped down and naked with their clothes on the shelves. What caught both our eyes was Ellie's backpack was among the shelves! This was not a good sign and was only another reason to make haste and find her.

When we entered the real dining area I saw Ellie, I was ecstatic at first but then I noticed a man on top of her. I knew what he was trying to do and it disgusted me to the brim. I stomped my foot against the ground on some broken plate shards causing them both to look at my direction. I raised my arm up calling an ice spike that entered the mans leg lifting him off the ground. he exclaimed and with a look of terror and shock he started to hyperventilate when he saw what exactly happened and who did it. Ellie got up and ran to me and Joel while my face stayed the same cold and expressionless glare.

I slowly walked towards the man making an extra show by having the ground turn to a thin layer of ice for every step. When I was in the mans face I looked to my left and saw a machete laying on the floor, I picked the thing up, flipped it in the air and grabbed it by the blunt side of the blade and handed the handle to Ellie. "You do the honors and kill this sick bastard" I said "with fucking pleasure" she said grabbing the machete from my hands. As she approached the man his eyes went off me and to his approaching executioner with a new expression in his eyes, fear. "No wait please! don't do it NO PLEA" he was interrupted as the machete, in one quick motion was lodged in his skull.

Ellie pulled out the machete with a struggle and when it was out she continued to hack at the man mercilessly until Joel pulled her away where she began to sob in his arms. We left the burning diner and continued through the cold blizzard of the remains of this town of cannibals. A few days after that ordeal Ellie seemed more... distant then before. I started to become concerned for her mental state after that, she seemed bent but not broken which was good. Joel tried to comfort her to his best with the conversations we all had before this but her playful and curious attitude was replaced with something new... determination. It felt unnatural of her it was scary to say the least. S

he wasnt the same girl we remembered is the most I could say for it. We continued to Salt Lake City with our year-long quest almost over but I had a nagging feeling that this wasnt going to end with them taking her blood and we leave. That was too easy and that scared me more than anything.


	13. Kids Will Be Kids

The blizzard had turned us around and we spent a few hours heading in the entirely wrong direction. On our way back to the path we saw a giant supermarket, or as I call them "a store with stores in it". We decided it would be best to scavenge inside the place and even more so considering Joel's wound has'nt entirely healed so when we got inside the building me and Ellie asked Joel if he can stay behind to recover

"what about him?" said Joel referring to me and my healed wound

"Ellie removed the shotgun pellets and then my super healing recovered the rest you however still need bed rest" I said to Joel.

"fine but you stay by his side at all times" Joel said to Ellie.

She decided to joke around by latching herself to my arm saying "aye aye".

She let go and we headed into the supermarket our first priority finding something to help Joel's wound. His wound was recovering but we can tell it still hurts like a bitch for him. The silence and cold was looming over us and I began to think

"was this a date?" I mean look at the facts, one being that we were the same age group, second we were friends, third this place was where teens would hang out before the outbreak. The silence made it awkward so I decided to break it

"I remember my parents telling me that back before all this started kids would just hang out by their favorite stores talking with their friends and not buy anything"

"that's weird" she said "I mean this place was meant to buy stuff so why just wait outside?"

"I don't know" I said confused as well.

We entered one shop which looked like a pharmacy shop, maybe it has medicine for Joel!

"probably looted to hell" Ellie said examining the inside

"most likely, should we bother with it?" I asked reforming my thought

"probably not, all the shelves are empty from the looks of it" she said staring through the window.

We continued through the mall and entered what looked like a costume store

"wonder if they have any Halloween candy?" I said rummaging the ransacked shelves.

I didn't hear Ellie respond to that, in fact I didn't hear her at all! as if she disappeared completely I couldn't even hear her footsteps, I got concerned and began to search the store for her. when I turned the corner I saw a Ellie wearing a fucking runner mask and she screamed right into my ear

"AH FUCK!" I exclaimed getting a barrage of spikes ready.

She started to take off the mask saying "calm down prissy pants, jesus man, you almost scared me with that scream of yours"

"fuck off" I said embarrassed.

while inside the shop I actually managed to find some candy bars called "snickers"... weird name,

"look what I found" I called,

Ellie came over with some shock in her eyes

"no way first soda now candy what next? a fucking machine gun?" she said surprised by my find

"probably expired anyway" I said throwing it away

"aw man" she said saddened.

We were on the second floor of the mall and when I looked down on the first floor through a broken side railing I saw a red and blue car with their windows broken and a bunch of bricks lying next to them.

"looks like some kids beat us here" I said while examining the cars from the second floor.

When she saw the cars below us she got quiet and she looked sad.

"what's wrong?" I asked

"its nothing lets keep moving" she said.

That was strange even for her, why is she so glum now? We continued until I saw the entrance of an electronics store. I went through the broken window, Ellie following behind.

"why are we in here?" she asked

"I don't know, just felt adventurous is all" I said.

As we explored I kept examining these weird-looking devices called eye phones and other weird things.

"hey check this out!" she said,

when I went over to her location my eyes were blinded by a bright light and Ellie started to chuckle.

"I found a camera!" she said obviously excited by her find

"how is that thing working?" I asked

"I don't know but there are these weird things on top of it and when I came to the light it started to turn on" she said handing me the camera and through some observations I found out it was solar-powered.

"Perfect idea! lets pose in front of it and both just pull the finger" I said

"why?" she asked confused to my motives

"imagine a scavenger walking in here and looking through that camera just to see two kids flicking him off"

"wow so mature" she said getting the camera ready to snap the picture.

We both pulled the finger in front of the thing and when it flashed we both just started to laugh hysterically. We left the camera in the sun and left the shop. when we got to the center of the mall we saw a helicopter with the roof almost coming down on top of it.

"I bet there's a medical kit for Joel in there!" Ellie said "try flying there" she asked me

"no can do kid, it looks unstable and if I just suddenly appeared in it my weight would cause it to collapse, we have to find another way in it" I said.

When we came down to the first floor we heard two clickers appear from the shop to our left. They heard us drop down so they knew we were here, and our only way out was fighting. I froze the first one in place exposing its throat so Ellie could stab it while the second one charged me leaving it exposed to an ice shard that quickly took care of it.

"there is bound to be more" I said to Ellie

"right let's get to the chopper" she said.

We climbed up some broken escalators towards the broken down roof that had just enough space for Ellie to squeeze through but not enough for me so I was simply lookout. While I was watching her get on the chopper I swear I saw movement on the floor below us. My speculations were right as an entire pack of infected emerged from the shop below us.

"I GOT IT" Ellie exclaimed holding up the medkit.

before I could warn her of the infected She tried to get off the plane but it was too unstable and the thing fell to the first floor with her stuck inside the thing creating a sound that did nothing but wake the dead. When she got out She saw the pack of infected and hid back inside the plane quick so the enough so they couldn't see her. I had to think of something and quickly they were going towards the chopper and soon they would find Ellie.

I made a really stupid idea but I had to buy her some time. I flew down there and started to scream to grab their attention.

"HEY FUCKWITS THREE STAR MEAL RIGHT HERE" I screamed at the top of my lungs.

The infected turned towards me and started make a mad dash for me

"TONY" I heard Ellie scream emerging from the chopper.

Luckily the infected paid no mind to her while I ran deeper into the mall with the pack still chasing me. I had no idea how long I was running before I looked back, probably seconds but when I looked behind me they were still charging so I decided to do something I hadn't done in nearly three years. I stopped in place and looked at the now closing in infected pack, I felt the coolness of my body become overwhelming and soon I threw my arms at them summoning a multitude of ice peaks from the ground that froze anything that it touched.

The infected were stopped but I had no idea how to get back to Ellie.


	14. Old Wounds

Ellie started to follow the path that Tony took. No way he could die at the pace he was running. As she was moving she found a hallway with the infected frozen in place like a hall of mannequins. However Tony wasnt anywhere in sight,

"he must have continued farther into the mall" she thought venturing deeper.

She had a strange sense of déjà vu from being here wandering the empty halls of the mall, as if something was longing for her. Forget it that was a year ago! she needs to move on. She walked into what looked like a flooded garage and across from her was Tony. When she was about to step foot in the water Tony saw her and flew to her area, grabbed her and yelled STOP.

"what why?" she said scared,

Tony remembering about his temperature let her go very hastily

"see those infected there" he said pointing to some bodies in the water "the water is electrified, we can't cross but I can fly across but now I need to find a way for you" he said.

he went and flew towards the double doors that was the entrance she came through and placed a plank to gap there platforms however some of it touched the water but their rubber shoes would null the shock. When Ellie crossed the gap they heard yelling coming from the hallway they just came from, the infected were thawed out!

She saw Tony fly towards the other platform and yell for her to block the door. she grabbed a pipe and closed the doors placing the pipes in the handles just as the infected were about to burst through she then crossed through the plank to Tony's platform. The doors were shivering under the constant blows of the infected behind it.

"Kick the plank!" exclaimed Ellie

"can't do that its touching the water if I dip my foot in water will seep inside and ill get electrocuted and touching with our hands will shock us too" he said

"crap now what" she said as the pipe was coming loose.

He stood there for a second before speaking up

"I never tried this before but it's too dangerous, I could fly you across to that truck over there" he said directing towards the truck closest to them.

"how's it dangerous?" Ellie asked

"for one thing you have to hold onto me and you might catch hypothermia, secondly I never tried it before it was always too risky for her sake"

"who's her?" Ellie thought "screw it I'm going to fly today" she said without hesitation.

The doors continued to bang and soon the pipe was about ready to snap, the infected arms reaching out through the small crack catching nothing but air. Tony handed Ellie his sweater and when she put it on she latched on to him where she began to feel very cold. Even with two sweaters she was already freezing up. Then that feeling went away when she felt... light, like she had became ethereal and faded from existence itself, it was scary but exhilarating, she actually thought she died for a second but she didn't care she had just flew and it was amazing!

When they were on the truck she let go of him. Luckily the two sweaters prevented her from dying but she felt numb still. The infected broke through the door and they both saw the light show as they all entered the water and all died, fried to a crisp. The smell of burning flesh was imminent+

"okay now that that's over let's get out of here" Tony said,

Ellie slowly got warm and soon they found a ventilation shaft they climbed on top of and walked to the other side of the garage. They landed on a platform with a generator on it and headed towards the next set of double doors. When they left it they were again at the entrance of the mall. The cold once again nipped at their breath

"you still have that medkit?" asked Tony

"yup" said Ellie shaking her backpack, then her thoughts wandered back to what he said back at the garage. "you mentioned someone at the garage, who was she?" Ellie asked

"I'd rather not talk about it" he said

"come on I thought we were friends here?" she said trying to pursued him

"she was a very good friend, lets keep it at that okay?" he said.

"What kind of good friend?" Ellie asked

"friend, girlfriend, or wife whatever you think" he said coldly

Ellie was not satisfied but in time he'd open up soon, she knew something bad happened but her curiosity had always gotten the best of her, she will find out. they continued through the massive mall while Ellie thought of possibilities to get him to talk, each option being crossed out. She eventually gave up and decided to have fun in this giant mall again.

Joel must be worried sick, oh well. She noticed Tony looking at a calender and then his expression became depressed when he got to April. When she walked up to him she noticed another thing, his backpack was glowing a subtle purple, she had never noticed that before. She managed to sneak out what was in his backpack and was surprised to see a weird-looking rock. It was purple, it made a soft humming noise, and it felt warm when she held it.

"whats this?" she said holding it out to him

"something I found while running from those infected" he said

"yeah but... what is it?" Ellie said still confused

"all I know is that my parents told me about these things called 'blast cores' meaning that one of them must have lived in my hometown, they also said that a man like me used them to help increase his powers" he explained

"so why don't you use it?" Ellie asked

"another time maybe, let's get back to Joel" he said.

When they got back to Joel he was laying on his back asleep and snoring like a bear. Tony applied the medkit to his wound and now he began to feel somewhat better. That wound will heal in no time now. Soon they left the mall of Ellies past and continued in the right direction to Salt Lake City. Ellie still pondered however as to Tony's "friend" who was she? why mention her now? She doesn't want to invade his personal life but she is curious and now that she was interested she must find out.


	15. The Past Is Forever

**AUTHORS NOTE: I feel that loss is inevitable in life whether it be a loved one or a close friend it always happens and so the next two chapters will be focused on Tony's past with his accomplice**

The nightmares never stopped ever since a few months ago after Ellie ran off with one of Tommy's horses, constant memories played on a replay tormenting me of my past mistakes and what I could have done instead. Were they nightmares? blessings? Reminders of my past mistakes to mock me? I lost more than just my parents but also my only friend in this crap infested world. I met her when I was fourteen years old in the now ending summer of Virginia, I was just wandering the ruins of earth I had no destination and no companion I knew that I had two choices in life at this point.

Either join a dying rebellion or live in a dictatorship ruled area called a quarantine zone both deciding the fate of humanity. Well I made a new choice, neutral, I would choose nothing I will simply survive never joining a group or anything just wander. I can't cause harm and I can't do good, just the way I want it, no chaos and no arguments just silence and that's how I wanted it to stay. However everything changed when I met her.

I wandered into an apartment building hoping to find a few scraps to eat, the building felt hollowed out but then I heard something that sounded like clattering in the hallway above me. I climbed up the stairs deciding instead of ignoring it but to investigate. When I made it to the floor above me I stood in the hall waiting for something to happen, what was I waiting for? I have no idea still. Either way I heard more clattering and then I saw a door in front of me collapse and a girl fall to the ground with a runner on top of her. She was screaming bloody murder and she was thrashing too much so I could not get a good look at her.

I had two choices, leave her, or save her, I considered the first option until I heard her cry out to me from across the hall,

"HELP ME!" she screamed.

Now it was something different, I had to help her, I couldn't run too her from the other side of the hall so I had to use my powers. I slowly called in a small ice spike to make sure I don't hit her when aiming. to her it looked like I was drawing a gun, when I launched the projectile it went straight through the runners head and she moved the body and began to stand up.

"Thank you so much how could I" she stopped when she looked up and saw I had no weapons on me at all. Make note of this, I cannot use firearms or else they will turn brittle and break, also the gunpowder will not activate when the spark is ignited inside the gun. "Wait how did you do that?" she asked slowly approaching me,

I got a better look at her, she had black hair that ran to the base of her neck, and a freckle on her left cheek that looked well with her sapphire eyes, she also wore an oversized green shirt with jeans, why are jeans the fashion choice of the apocalypse? When I looked at the gun in her holster it was very strange, she had a .44 magnum with the handle enveloped in a soft cushion like substance, not something you see for a little girl.

"Why was she coming to me?" was a thought that came to mind,

normal people would have run screaming realizing I had nothing to use to kill something and I had just murdered a runner. "um I threw a knife at it" I said, I am a horrible liar was a thought I had after that.

She looked back at the hunter and saw no knife in its head

"tell me the truth" she said, she was about a meter away from me now.

"okay fine" I said,

I summoned up a small pillar of ice to show her what I could do. She backed off from me and exclaimed

"what was that!?" shocked by my law defying abilities. Her look of shock mellowed for some reason.

"Don't worry I wont hurt you" I said trying to calm her down more

"why would you? you just saved me" she said approaching me again.

"Well why aren't you freaking out" I asked confused by her calm tone

"A fungus took over the world, there is a group of people whose mascot is a bug, and a dictatorship is deciding the fate of all humanity, hell I wouldn't be surprised if dogs started to talk at this point" she said calming down more, "so how are you doing that?" she asked.

I explained the conduit gene to her while her eyes grew wider with excitement.

"That is so cool, but why are you here than if you were born in Florida?" she asked

"when my parents died I started to wander America, what about you?" I asked

"my mom and dad were fireflies and when I was ten they went to attack a supply convoy from soldiers... they never came back, when they didn't arrive I blamed the fireflies for their death and in a fit of rage I packed up and left" she explained

"how old are you?" I asked

"fourteen, you?" she said

"same" I answered

"you mind tagging along with me? I could use the company, it gets lonely in this big bad world" she looked at me with sad eyes.

"Sure why not?" I said

"great what's your name?" she asked

"Zaroff, and yours?" I said

"my names Katherine and your name is too weird, how about snowman?" she asked with wide eyes.

I declined first but she kept persisting till I accepted. Thus started our new friendship and I must say it was the greatest choice I ever made in my life, not the name part, my choice of staying because she was my light in a world of darkness and blood. While exploring we found a calendar when she brought up birthdays

"when were you born?" she asked

"I can't remember actually I think in the spring tell me yours"

"same season" she said happily.

After some more discussions we decided that we would share a birthday, April seventeenth, the day we met each other, it was really cheesy but we couldn't decide a better date. We were basically inseparable at that point. We would do everything together, laugh, cry, and eat together. When I came to the topic of my body temperature one day she asked

"can't you control it?"

truth be told I can, but only to a certain degree, if I warm myself up its like running a marathon and then being told to go and take a steam bath, for me that is deadly. It also takes a lot of energy out of me so I would most likely pass out from exhaustion.

"I guess so, yeah" I answered, she nodded and said

"good to know",

Katherine was crazy yet at the same time the smartest person I knew, we stayed in Virginia for most of the year because Virginia was a lot more calm than most other states for some reason. One day we were exploring an old grocery store for extra supplies where we found out we weren't alone in the place, it was infested with clickers. We discovered this when were at the back of the store so now we had to make our way back to the front entrance. While were heading down an aisle a clicker came into view in front of us startling Katherine and making her lose her footing and land on her back.

The clicker screeched causing all the others to be alerted to our presence. The first one pinned her to the ground while another three came from behind the aisle. I killed the first one with a quick shard of ice to the head while the others came at us with a murderous intent. She got up and pulled out her pistol and began to fire at them, I flew to the remaining ones causing an explosion of ice spikes when I landed killing the remaining ones. When we thought it was safe a clicker came up behind Katherine grabbing her by the shoulders, I couldn't fly their, not enough time, but when I raised my arm to call an ice shard something better happened.

A beam of pure cold energy escaped my hand, almost like a laser beam except made of ice. Just before the clickers teeth met her neck the death beam obliterated its skull sending frozen fragments of fungus everywhere. When it collapsed to the floor Katherine froze up in place unmoving.

"Are you okay?" I said approaching her.

She just stood there frozen by fear or shock and when she looked up at me she ran to me faster than a bullet. Even Usain Bolt would be put to shame by her speed. I realized something else, a ninety-five pound teenage girl just tackled me, a conduit, with enough force to knock me off my feet. When she collided with my body I had to quickly change my temperature to a safe level and then I realized something. She was hugging me! this was the first one I felt in god knows how long. The strain of changing my temperature was already taking effect while she was crying into my shoulders. She wouldn't let go of me practically sucking the life out of me and Soon I passed out in her arms. Sweet right? the answer is no.

I woke up later in a tent at night with Katherine sleeping beside me, and when I saw beside I meant a good few feet away. I slowly got up and left the tent she had set up. We were in a park littered with falling leaves, I sat down outside the tent to simply feel the flow of the cold air. I closed my eyes and began to focus on my powers again. It always helped channeling my powers it made it easier to call in ice at a seconds notice. After a few minutes of this I heard crunching leaves and then I hear her sitting beside me again, I open my eyes to see her examining me again with her eyes, curious, and beautiful.

"What did you do back there?" she asked

"what do you mean?" I said hastily closing my eyes again

"that weird laser thing you did, you usually use a sharp pieces of ice but this was something new, why have you never used it before?" she continued

"I don't know maybe a spur of the moment thing" I answered.

Silence hung over for a few seconds then I head her speak

"you care about me" she cooed.

I open my eyes faster than a cheetah and looked at her, she was slightly blushing

"no I don't! it was just instinct is all" I said

"your instincts care about me" she said teasingly.

I grumbled under my breath and she slid closer to me.

"Your crazy" I said

"tell me something I don't know" she replied sliding another inch closer to my side.

Did I love her? no can't be that conduits aren't capable of love right? Didnt matter she was here and I felt safer, something about knowing that I'm not alone facing a huge world was comforting. Too bad nothing good ever lasted in this world.


	16. Sins Are Unwashable

"Why are you always brooding?" Katherine asked while we were wandering the streets of Boston.

"I don't brood." I said defending my honor

"try smiling than" she asked.

When I gave my best smile she recoiled back rasing her arm to her mouth "OH DEAR GOD WHAT IS THAT!" She exclaimed seeing my smile.

"It's not that bad is it?" I asked

"you look like a deformed clown." She said not so subtly.

I brushed this off and continued to brood.

It was only two more days till our first birthday and we will officially become fifteen. Katherine was always bouncing around about it like it was a big deal. She didn't know what I had planned still which was good considering it was a surprise. We had a new goal after we left Virginia, head to Vermot, the fungus prefers hot areas anyway and it was cold as hell in the winter down there so we exchanged route ideas and here we are in boston.

I guess we both shared the same feelings about each other but we never made a big deal out of it. she still called me Snowman despite learning my real name a long time ago for the sake of annoying me and also she thought it was a cute 'pet name'. After some more wandering we something that perked our ears. We found a music store in the abandoned streets and entered it through the broken windows. Not sure why though? We were still surprised to see that most of the instruments remained unbroken, although the bass instruments were rusted to oblivion but the strings were still stable. instead of playing around with the cellos and violins we did something stupider. We started to sword fight with the bows.

We were completely oblivious to the strings on bows which were not that sharp but with enough force it can cut. Kind of like hundreds of paper cuts at the same time. Katherine hit me in the arm, however I didn't feel anything considering I was a conduit. In a retaliation I struck her arm and the bow slid across her arm fluently and I struck hard! Her arm began to bleed excessively considering I ran the entire length of the bow across her arm. She dropped the bow and looked at the huge gash in her arm yowling in pain.

Blood dripped down onto the floor while the second half of her arm was now slated in crimson. if I wasn't a conduit I wouldn't have done jack diddly but I was more precise with my swipes.

"SHIT! LET ME GRAB SOMETHING." I exclaimed rummaging my empty backpack.

She spoke drowsily "Well if you don't mind I'm going to pass out now." She collapsed on the cold ground while she continued to bleed.

She is losing a lot more blood than I realized! Upon closer examination it turns out I hit her a few more times on both her arm and all the cuts were bleeding more. Damn her fragile skin! I picked up her arms to see how bad the wound was and I noticed that the bleeding was slowing down. That's when I realized that I was slowing down the bleeding. I was numbing and slowing the bleeding! I began to rub my arms against the wound to the point that the blood stopped entirely. I searched her backpack for something to cover it and found some bandages. I wrapped it around all the now clean cuts and now all that was left to do was wait for her to regain consciousness.

I couldn't move her or else she will get hypothermia and I can't drag her without risking the wounds re opening so I simply placed my sweater on top of her and waited. Minutes turned to hours and night soon descended upon the cold and empty streets. I began to practice with my powers when I heard something down the street, or rather someone.

"Spread out we got to cover as much ground as possible." said a mysterious man.

I peeked over the window to see a group of five men walking down the streets. They weren't fireflies from the looks of them, they wore rags and torn sweaters, Hunters! No one would investigate a music store, its pointless to do so! Just wait them out and they will leave. Then I heard Katherine groan and turn in her sleep. I clenched my fists and found somewhere to hide behind the checkout counter. This woman just loves to mess with me even when unconscious for crying out loud.

"Go check it out!" The first hunter said,

I heard footsteps approach the shop and I clasped onto one of the bows hoping to get a cheap shot on one of them with it. I hid behind the checkout desk hoping they would just pass through, that made me realize that Katherine was still out in the open! The hunter mounted over the window and saw her laying on the ground.

"I found someone here." he exclaimed to the others.

I didn't have time to wait, I jumped over the counter and swung the bow at his face causing a small gash on his cheek.

"AH FUCK!" He exclaimed seeing he wasn't alone.

He grabbed the bow from my hands and threw it out to the streets, he pulled his gun on me and just before he pulled the trigger I grabbed onto his head and began freeze his brain. He was screaming in pain as his head turned slowly to ice and just as his friends came out of cover to see what was happening all they saw was me crushing their pals skull to millions of pieces. They began to scream saying stuff like

"WHAT THE FUCK."

"KILL THE FREAK."

"SHOOT HIM."

I had to think of a plan but due to the fact that there was no cover other than the counter I had nowhere to go without being seen. I heard gunshots slice the air past my head to the wall behind me. I summoned an ice shard and launched it at a hunter running for cover penetrating his heart. The second one had a shotgun and started to run for me, I quickly dispatched of him but he was a slippery one. I made the mistake of focusing on him only. After a few seconds I didn't hear anything. No footsteps or shouting. That is until I felt a searing pain on my back. One of them had snuck up on me and now their was a shiv lodged in my shoulder-blade. I collapsed from the sudden pain and landed on top of the cold ground. The man removed the shiv from my body and stabbed at my leg to make sure I couldn't move. I can recover quicker than regular humans but not THAT fast. When I was squirming to get up he spat at me.

"Motherfucker! those were my friends." he exclaimed.

he looked over to Katherine's body and looked back at me. He kicked me in the ribs and said.

"What? you worried about your bitch? don't worry I'll make sure she dies quickly."

I couldn't get up, the pain was unbearable and my leg injury made it impossible to stand. Then I heard more glass crunching as the second hunter entered the building. I felt a gun pressed against my temple forcing itself down causing even more pain. I heard the hammer of his revolver click and then after a brief moment of silence...

**bang**.

The weird part was that nothing went black, I didn't feel that 'coldness envelope my body' everyone says they feel when experiencing death. I felt the same and then I heard a body hit the floor

"WHAT THE FUCK?" I heard the hunter exclaim. Then I heard another shot.

I heard light footsteps run over to my side and someone kneeled beside me.

"Oh shit are you okay?" I heard a familiar voice say.

"If I can't stand up I don't think I'm what you call 'okay'." I said.

Something about her voice calmed me down, it said that everything was going to be fine. Despite my leg injury I felt safer, although I will never meet my dream of being a soccer player.

"hold on I'll get something for your leg." she said while rummaging through her backpack.

"Well if you don't mind I say its my turn to pass out." I said while everything was blacking out.

I woke up in a familiar tent with a familiar someone sleeping beside me. When I went outside I saw that it was morning, I had fought those hunters at night so our birthday was still tomorrow if its morning now. She woke up as well, I do not wake up very subtly if she woke up, that or she was watching me the entire time.

... Okay that's really awkward when I think about it.

When she came out she was surprised to see my leg already working again.

"Well isnt someone Special?" she said sitting down beside me.

She was comfortable enough with me to sit almost right next to me with about an inch of a gap between us with the experience we had knowing eachother.

We sat there and let the scenery overtake us.

"Dont you ever wish to just sit down and never get up?" I asked

"I think you could do that back then." She said

"that's so weird considering where we live now, you know I always wondered, how do you define insanity in a place like this?" I asked

"I say were all crazy in one way or another and that being sane is a rare genetic mutation that limits survivability." She said with honesty

I thought about her answer when another question came to mind "how did you get that gun of yours anyway? big gun for a little girl if you ask me." I said trying to tease her.

"For your information I am the perfect size for this gun and secondly I stole it from the fireflies before I left." She explained

"Dirty girl." I said

"you don't know the half of it." she chuckled.

We packed up the tent and ventured farther into the ruins of this old city of Boston, not a huge loss from what I heard, I remember hearing Boston was a shit hole before the outbreak. After night settled over and Katherine went to sleep I went to work on the surprise. I spent almost the entire night working on this to show how I felt despite her knowing. It was hard, gruesome work but I wanted one day of peace, and this was the day to do it.

After hours of work The small cracks of sunlight began to appear and I knew I was finished. When she emerged from the tent her eyes went from exhausted to wide with shock and joy. What she saw was a creation of my work, it was cheesy but hell, it looked awesome. It was a depiction of me and her in what I think was a wedding altar made of clear crystalline with every detail showing inside the clear ice of our faces. She walked down the aisle of the snowy wonderland with the same look as she approached me. There was a strange silence that filled the air but it wasnt one of suspense or melancholy no it was awe. When she was near me she looked at me and smiled saying.

"Your so corny"

"you know me" I said raising my arms up

"and I love you for it" she said taking my hand while wearing what appeared to be a full blizzard survival kit.

Then I noticed something on her left wrist. It looked like a bracelet but it looked handcrafted, there were 3 colors on it, one side had blue, one had red, and the two sides had purple.

"Whats that?" I asked pointing towards the bracelet.

She started to pull another one out of her pocket and handed it to me saying.

"Well first put it on."

I put on the strange bracelet which for some reason didn't snap from the sheer cold. "So now can you explain the strange device." I said.

"Well you know about 'wedding rings' right?" she asked.

"yeah I guess" I said still uncertain.

"Well I decided to make wedding bracelets" She answered.

"To think that you called me the corny one, so whats with the survival gear?" I asked.

"oh nothing special" she said while giving me a seductive stare.

Just before I could think of a response she leaned over just an inch away from my face, and then she closed the gap suddenly with her lips meeting mine. I attempted to change my body temperature but was surprised to see she didn't have any changes in hers. Granted she was wearing about three sets of sweaters but still this was the only warmth I felt in a long time. I wished nothing more than to make the moment last. Then a thought popped into my mind. "Did we just get married?!" Either way a few moments passed before she pulled back I only looked at her uncertain about what to think and I said

"I have no idea how to react to this." I said dumbfounded

"Trust me, I do." She said before closing the gap again.

The warmth was nice, before I couldn't stand the heat because I felt like I would melt on the spot, but this one felt nice, it didn't burn but it wasn't unfelt, it was perfect to say the least. She moved back and looked at me again with those eyes and said something to me that will always stay even now.

"Never leave me snowman".

I don't know why but those words stuck with me and all I could say was. "Say the words and I'll come running."

She smiled and I knew I said the right thing. "By the way I am not that fat!" she said killing the mood and pointing towards the statue of her.

"Oh please your like a perfect marshmallow" I said

"_sigh_, well I guess I'm your marshmallow" she replied.

Our bond was unbroken, she was the closest thing that came to a friend, hell I was comfortable enough to cal her a girlfriend, although she still insisted on the fact we kinda got married so I should refer to her as my wife but calling her Katherine still felt natural, like how she called me snowman it just stayed. I still hate that name keep that in mind. Our relationship was corny as hell but what do you expect in a world like this? we can't have a wedding with clickers clapping in the crowd while a bloater read the damn book.

After we packed up and left she had a look of surprise on her face and quickly pulled something out of her backpack.

"I also found this for you aswell." she said holding out a strange rock.

"Whoah, where did you get this?" I asked completely mind blown by this purplish rock that emitted a strange hum.

"One of those hunters had it on him after you were attacked and I had to bail your sweet ass out of trouble." She said.

"Well my ass is one worth saving" I answered back.

She giggled at the quick joke and we continued on our way to new York. The rock she gave me looked familiar, I remember my parents telling me about something called "blast cores" the way it looked matched the description. To think a hunter found it. We made some new plans and the worst mistake we made was deciding to stay in Boston for the rest of spring. The supplies weren't that scarce and the nearby quarantine zone made it too easy to pinpoint where the nearest supplies are through some simple eavesdropping on some ahem 'classified information' we managed to find small supply caches, although we may have caused some half ration weeks but hey we were hungry too!

However our antics stirred up some suspicion from the FEDRA troops who became curious about why some supply convoys came back shorthanded. They set the perfect trap and we took it like mindless fish. We wandered into an empty street hoping for an easy score but what we weren't expecting was a spotlight to come down on the both of us and the hailstorm of bullets that followed. We both managed to take some cover by some nearby rubble and a fallen military truck but they were smart enough to stop shooting.

"Flush them out."

"Kill the fireflies."

We heard all sorts of radio chatter coming from the FEDRA troops now scouring for us in the rubble below. Katherine was grazed by a bullet on the shoulder but she brushed it off like it was nothing. The FEDRA troops were slowly closing in on us, I may have an increased pain tolerance but i'm not bulletproof. We were going to die plain and simple. I decided looked up out of cover only to see a soldier with a gas mask looking right at me.

"I FOUND THEM!" he exclaimed before Katherine pulled him behind our cover and shot him in the head.

That set off the soldiers and now they were slowly approaching us. I made something like a smoke grenade except it's more like a blizzard grenade, do I need to explain it?

"On the count of three we get the hell out of here" I said to Katherine

I raised the swirling ball of mist ready to chuck it at the soldiers.

"Three...Two...ONE!"

I threw the mist at the soldiers and when it hit the ground a blizzard storm erupted making it nearly impossible for them to see in front of their own face. We were home free right? it was safe? We were dead wrong. They came ready and we weren't prepared. They had night vision goggles on for crying out loud! I was so stupid how did I not know they'd come prepared? They were military personnel with top-notch equipment! Not just some random hunters! Either way we were out in the open and they saw us clear as day and began to fire at us. Luckily some bullets nudged us at the speed we were moving at but one of them hit Katherine!

"DROPPED ONE!" I heard a soldier say

She collapsed on the ground and when I looked behind me after hearing that sound of a body hitting the ground my heart froze. I saw her lying there trying to roll on her side, struggling for life. I rushed to her side and I dragged her behind some more cover when I saw where the bullet shot her. The bullet penetrated her lung and she was coughing blood.

"NO NO NO you cannot die on me now!" I exclaimed shaking her.

She simply looked at me with those green eyes that showed two things love, and sadness. With barely any life left she spoke, hearing her voice was painful, she sounded like she was half gurgling and half rasping as she spoke.

"Dont worry about me... just get out of here... I'll miss you snowman." than she went limp.

Tears streaked down my face seeing the only person I loved just died right in front of me. I didn't even get a chance to say how much I loved her! I felt so many things at that moment, sadness, grief, melancholy, regret, but the one emotion that stood out was pure undeniable rage! I slowly stood out of cover seeing that my smoke was now starting to dissipate.

"there he is." I heard one of the soldiers speak.

I came out with my hands up and slowly walked out of cover. My teeth were gritting and I felt actual heat. They raised their guns on me but not firing. Moments of silence went by but then I heard one of the soldiers speak up.

"Execute the firefly."

I head a barrage of gunfire but in that moment I let my full potential break loose. The only thing they saw was a blue mist manifest into a person before their eyes and then all hell went loose. The first person I grabbed was a middle-aged man, the terror in his eyes was almost pitiful, I said almost. I shattered his skull into pieces in a second resulting in one of his teammates to charge me with their weapon ready to bash in my head. She was a woman but did that matter? I quickly turned around with a shiv made of ice and jabbed her heart extracting it just as quickly as she ran into it. The third one was staring at me with fear and dropped his weapon.

"Please don't kill me!" He pleaded.

Pathetic! however His voice sounded familiar, that's right! He was the one that shot her! The fury in my eyes burned even more than ever! You know those stories where the good guy spares the villan claiming he's better than them? Well this wasn't one of those moments I never understood that. I knocked him to the ground where my foot rested on his throat. "WHAT ARE YOU?!" He exclaimed

"I'm the thing you wish you never pissed off." I said with a voice as cold as steel,

"NO PLEA-." He was cut off as my foot crushed his esophagus.

The other soldiers watching ceased fire and let me go. I picked up Katherine's body and left the offending area. I buried her near the spot where we shared our kiss with her magnum and bracelet. I kept mine on and continued onwards looking for something new to fight for. My dreams plagued me like this. A never ending cycle of the year I spent with her. Always ending the same, I cant change it and now it will haunt me for the rest of my life. I'm willing to accept my punishment. Just please wait till this is over. Just let me end this quest and I will happily go.


	17. The Drunk Bellow

**ELLIES POINT OF VIEW FTW**

The day started as usual, Tony and Joel were up and packing the supplies while I took my sweet time getting up. What can I say? I'm not a morning person. Either way Tony seemed to act normal again after the mall incident however I noticed something on his wrist that was usually covered by his sweater. How is he wearing a sweater in the middle of spring? The thing on his wrist looked like a colored bracelet? Whatever he seems pretty sensitive about his past so it's probably best I don't ask anything.

It was probably the most peaceful day of traveling we had in months! However after night settled Tony began to rummage his backpack and pulled something out saying

"In celebration to our quests near completion how about a drink to lighten the mood?"

He pulled out what looked like... Vodka! Okay so this guy can find just about anything now cant he? He offered a sip to Joel who politely declined. When the bottle came to me I thought. 'Its the damn apocalypse why the hell not?' I grabbed the bottle and when the liquid touched my tounge I started to spit it back out. Okay more like gag it back out.

"Dear god that tasted like fucking death!' I exclaimed while trying to get the taste out of my mouth.

Tony started laughing and than we heard something come from his laughing. We heard hm snort! Moment I heard that I started to laugh like a crazy girl and that caused Tony to laugh and snort more fueling my laughter further. Joel was just watching with a grin on his face seemingly unaffected by this. After a few minutes of this we calmed down and Tony raised the bottle high above his head.

"To the friends and family we lost on the way, and to the hopes of seeing them again."

Joel raised his arm saying "Cheers."

I raised up my arm as well "Cheers".

'"Cheers" Tony said before sipping the bottle. "What day is it?" Tony asked

"If I'm correct it's the seventeenth of April." Answered Joel.

Tony nodded and then continued to drink from the bottle. Why did that date seem so familiar to me?

After around thirty minutes or so I can safely confirm that Tony was drunk as hell. How drunk as hell? He was talking to broken down street lamp rambling about how he was supposed to be in Vermont with someone named 'Katherine' I guess that was the person he was so reluctant to bring up before. I walked up to him and when he turned around I saw his eyes and they seemed... warm. Back then his eyes were nothing special but now he seemed more open to talk. He stare at me for a second and asked.

"You like what you thee?" I guess being drunk gave him a lisp.

"Your drunk" I laughed out

"Your thexy." He pointed.

Just before he started to ramble about HOW sexy I was I cut him off trying to figure out more about his friend Katherine.

"Who is Katherine?" I asked almost regretted asking but I was glad to see his expression didn't change. I got ready to decode his lisp again.

"Well if memory therves right thee wath thomesing like a wife" He said struggling to regain balance and grabbing the pole to do it "thankth marcuth" He thanked the lamp? however his last word caught my attention 'wife'. I guess now I know why he never brings her up.

"Well I'm sorry you lost her" I said trying to comfort him.

He looked up again and said "You don't have to be thorry we all lotht people, you know I never knew that being a conduit meant that thith thtuff hit harder than ever" He said almost tipping over again.

"That and you drank the entire dang bottle" I said pointing to the empty glass in his hand.

"No, their ith thtill thome left, watch!" He began to tip the bottle over and nothing came out of it. "Okay maybe I had a bit too much for a perthon of my thtature" He said slightly embarrassed.

I spoke up saying "Tho why do you never bring her up?" Dammit the lisp was contagious! "We dethided to pith off thome tholdiers by thtealing their thtuff and we got caught by them, the rest ith hithtory or about a month from now it will be." He spoke a solemnly. "You thee this" He said pulling out the mysterious bracelet.

"Yeah what is it?" I asked

"She made a thing called a 'wedding brathlet' jutht for me and her" He fell over on that part.

I couldn't help but smile knowing that he still wore the thing. It was really sweet that he clung on to her memory, but it was very sad at the same time knowing what happened to her. "Altho I bet you didn't know that today ith our birthday." He explained.

My ears perked up again when he said that. "Well happy birthday to the both of you" I said, maybe I can grab a last-minute present out of my backpack.

"You don't have to grab a prethent" He said while I hastily rummaged through my backpack "Thith chat is more than enough, _hic_, tho when ith your birthday?" He asked.

"I think the fourteenth of june" I said racking my head for that memory.

He nodded and then spoke up again "Well if you don't mind me I'm going to path out now" Then he collapsed on the ground.

Knwoing what I can do for a birthday present I dragged him to his sleeping bag. I went to sleep after the half our struggle of shoving him inside his bag. I finally managed to close my eyes. When I woke up I heard the sound of a something dying? a moose maybe? Than I heard Tony's voice break from the sounds of death

"Why does my head hurt so much?" When I got out of my bag I saw Joel walk up to a shriveling and pained Tony eliciting a small chuckle

"That my friends is called a hangover" He said laughing at Tony.

"Please just let me die in peace" He begged while groaning in pain.

A few minutes and some puking sessions later we set sail again. Tony approached me with blood in his cheeks.

"So uh did I say anything stupid last night" He asked embarrassed.

"Well other than a bad lisp and calling me sexy that was it" I answered

"Oh my god!" He facepalmed himself "You know what they say 'a drunk mans words are a sober mans thoughts'." He tried to recover but I decided to push him a little more and have some fun.

"What do you like to look at?" I asked.

He almost collapsed at that point.

He stammered for a moment than found some words to use "Well uh I will admit I have a thing for girls with freckles" He said rubbing the back of his head. His face was redder than a tomato.

"Do you like my chest?" I asked trying to embarrass him further.

"As if there was anything on it" He said turning the tables

"Whats that supposed to mean?" I asked shocked.

I noticed Joel watching in the distance with the 'this is gold!' look on his face.

"Nothing... except that your flat chested" He said

"Is that a bad thing?" I asked getting a little angry.

"No I don't think so... do you?"

"I'm done with this goodbye" I walked off before it turned to a battle between fire and ice. Joel had a smug look on his face.

"Id say he won" He said.

I scoffed and simply continued forwards with the two chortling like mad men behind me.

**AUTHORS NOTE: We are nearing the end of the story, I made this one real quick as a simple 'comic relief' but I feel there was still some development involved. **


	18. Human Nobility

We entered what looked like An abandoned movie theatre which was turned into a checkpoint by the soldiers when the whole thing started. Some proof being the abandoned scanners and entrance way leading out of the theatre. We had to find away out of the place due to the main entrance being blocked. I looked over at Tony. I can't believe the kids parents gave him a name like 'Tony' I can't believe I prefer Zaroff better!

Tony was already on top of a ledge waiting to pull us up. He said that the most we can get from grabbing his hands was cold fingers but if we got closer to his body the changes in temperature will take effect. When he pulled Ellie up she simply stood there and Tony looked with amazement as well. At least I thought it was amazement I couldn't see from the angle I was in.

Ellie ran off and Tony quickly pulled me up. When we started to go after Ellie she was simply exclaiming how amazing this was. What has she spotted this time? Ellie was standing by the top of the stairwell and when I saw what was in front of us I could see what all the fuss was about. We saw a giraffe munching away at some of the foliage that had grown on the hole of the building we were in. Ellie looked at me with puppy dog eyes that said she wanted to pet the thing.

"Its alright go ahead, just move slowly alright" I said to the her.

She slowly approached the animal and when she put her hand on it she flinched just a little. I couldn't help but smile at this it was nice to see her hang loose again after the incident with the cannibals. I saw Tony staring at the thing as well however his eyes were more pondering like he was thinking deeply to himself.

A few minutes of petting went by and the giraffe moved on to new land. When we came to the top of the building we could see a great sight unfurl before us. We saw an entire herd move before us in the overgrown park before us. The park was completely green the only thing showing that it was at one point in the modern time were the wilting fences that were brown with rust. Ellie stood by the railing watching as the herd slowly moved across the park

"Well, is this everything you wanted?" I asked leaning against the railing.

"Its got its up's and down's, but you can't deny that view though" She said staring off into the distance.

Tony nodded "Half as long twice as bright."

We continued down the stairwell till we found ourselves a short distance away from the hospital and had to cross through an underground passageway which was littered with old rusted cars. Than we met with a new problem which sent a shiver down my hardened spine.

The passage way was blocked by a bus, but the real problem was the army of infected before us. The scene was dimmer considering that supplies were running short ever since winter. I didn't have a lot of ammo left so our only option was to sneak past them. Even that looked like a stretch considering some of them were by the bus that was blocking our way.

"What do we do?" Ellie whispered

"We take our chances and try to get past them without anyone seeing us" I whispered the faulty plan to the both of them.

"Not possible look at that, they are all watching each other, if you take one of them out one will still see you" Tony said shattering hopes of escape. "There is still one way though but none of you will like it" He said while the look on his face growing darker by the second.

"Anything is good at this point" I said to him.

"I go out there and make enough noise to get them all to come for me while you guys climb over the bus, I don't think I'll make it though" He said, his face was practically a shadow.

"Why not" Ellie asked with a look of concern on her face.

"I use more energy than you think summoning an ice shard, and launching it is just as tiring, I'll be lucky to take a little more than ten of them out... The bloaters are a different story" He said slowly rising his head.

"Than don't do it kid we need you with us" Joel said in hopes that this plan wont be needed.

"Either way I'll have to use my powers but your first plan will result in all of us getting overrun so I need to buy you guys time"

"You don't have to do it though we can find another way!" Ellie exclaimed as quietly as she could.

"On the count of three you guys make your way to the bus and get on top of it." He explained

"Tony don't go doing this to us!" I said, I may have my share of loss but he was still young and deserving of a life.

"One... two" He flew towards the front of the pack of infected making our heads turn. "THREE, HEY FUCKERS ITS DINNER TIME!" He exclaimed at the top of his lungs setting off the infected that were now charging for him.

"NO!" Ellie practically shouted but luckily none of the infected heard her due to all their shouting and clicking.

###

I readied my powers for a hell of a fight. Dont worry Katherine I'll be with you soon! My debt will be paid in full. My job was simple, survive for as long as possible or until Joel and Ellie made it on top of the bus. I may be a conduit but even I tire from fighting and there was too many for me and my shards alone to handle. I didn't have time for a plan otherwise they might have talked me out of it so I was just put into a fight for my life with no plan with me. Fan fucking tastic, The first runner was on top of me before I even managed to process how close they were. I pushed him off me and quickly summoned a shard to dispatch him.

The infected did not care about my temperature they can get as close as they want and wont flinch from the cold. I looked at the mass of infected coming for me and I saw something flying through the air. Than I heard a silent explosion as the area around me exploded into an abundance of mycotoxin thanks to the bloaters.

I summoned an ice blade as a self-defence weapon for when I get grabbed. A clicker popped out of the cloud of toxin and grabbed me. Just before its ragged teeth tore out my jugular I plunged the knife inside its head however I barely noticed its teeth touching my shoulder over the sound of a runner bashing into me knocking me to the ground.

I knocked it off me with my enhanced strength and kicked its head in. The bloaters were slowly making their way towards me while the other infected made their way like mice to a rotting piece of food. I summoned a grenade of ice and threw it towards the crowd. Only a fraction were frozen and they were struggling with all their might to get out. I loomed over the distance and saw Ellie kicking down a box for Joel to climb on.

That quick distraction could have killed me when I felt two more bodies charge into me nearly knocking me down but I held my ground. I offered my arm to one of the runners to keep it at bay while encasing it in ice to make sure it doesn't bite. I Jammed the blade inside the second ones head. The first one was biting at the shield around my arm until I sent the blade through its head as well.

I saw Joel climbing on top of the box and on to the bus. They both looked at me and I couldn't read their facial expression from the distance away from each other but I did see one thing. A bloater was charging right for me in the crowd! The bloater smacked my head nearly breaking my neck with the sheer power It picked me up and I had to recreate my first encounter back at the gym. I turned my arms to five-inch thick ice and just before it grabbed my head I pushed it back. I was getting weaker cause that transformation was taking a lot out of me.

I have to run for it! there is no other option. I ran past the infected knocking them down as I rushed through the mass. However the few that weren't pushed were right behind me and closing fast. I didn't have enough energy to fly so I had to climb on the box.

Just before I got on the bus I felt my leg being grabbed. When I turned my head I nearly fainted at what I saw. A clicker was biting my foot!. Ellie and Joel pulled me up making the things teeth grind across my flesh eliciting a scream from me. Before the infected started to climb on the box I destroyed it by shattering the box to tiny pieces.

Knowing my fate I nearly jumped right back into the fray again but was stopped by Joel and Ellie pulling me to the other side of the bus.

"You okay?" Ellie asked "oh" was her only response when she saw the teeth marks on my leg.

We remained silent while the infected were attempting to knock over the bus. Joel and Ellie looked with shocked eyes as blood was pouring out of my bite. That's a funny thing to say "My bite" its like you own death itself. The funniest part was I was kind of glad, mainly because now I get the chance to see her again.

###

Fear gripped my heart as I clutched the blade in my pocket. I was expecting a lot of things but what I wasn't expecting was for Tony to slowly get up and just walk towards me. I have seen people break when they were bit and Tony was not an exception. He looked at me with dark eyes but not in anger or hatred but with sad remorse. He sighed and walked off farther into the passage way

"Come on lets move" He said

"But what about your bite" I asked

"I have maybe a day or two before I turn and I want to see you enter the hospital before I turn and then I'll do myself in" He spoke normally like he was never bit

"You sure about this?" Joel spoke up

"I just need to remember to put a shard of ice inside my head, not that hard right?" He spoke jokingly, "Look just drop it and lets move, please."

We continued to move in silence, Joel was quite out of respect, I was on the verge of tears for the fact I was going to lose another friend, he was silent while his mind was on the subject of another person. Than the universe threw me a curve ball. What she saw before her was natures last cruel joke. The system was flooded and the water current barreled down the passage. "Take your time on this there's no rush" Tony said. I started to move VERY slowly through the unstable and shaky cars with Joel and Tony behind me.

I had stepped on a bus that was threatening to let go of the two wedges it was stuck between. Joel had stepped on the door of a bus and when it caved in he was sent to the back of it. Me and Tony tried to get him out by slamming the other set of doors Joel was closest too while the bus shook more violently than ever.

Just as the door slightly creaked open the bus capsized and me and Tony were sent through the rushing waters. I was begging for air when it was knocked right out of me when I hit my gut against a car. Than everything went black when the back of my head hit something hard. I felt somewhat... lifted.

###

Water rushed inside my mouth as I hit the side of a car. I saw Ellie rasping for air and I tried to grab her. My fingertips barely grazed her shoe and then I was met with unending pain. I was sent hurdling through the cars rag dolling through them knocking whatever air I had left out of me.

I was just about ready to die there. Hell I was dead anyway wasn't I? After a few more seconds I was surprised to find myself on real land. I rasped for air as much as I could take in. Sweet air! I will never take you for granted again! I couldn't go back down there the current was too strong my only option was to wait. My heart jump started again when I saw Joel emerge with Ellie in his arms. My heart froze again when I saw that she was knocked out. Joel started to perform CPR on her while I was panicking and just watching.

"Hold on I'll find something to help!" I exclaimed.

When I turned around my face met the bunt end of an assault rifle and everything went dark.

**I'm not built to write big action scenes I prefer writing calm charachter development chapters so sorry if the fight seemed "lack luster"**


	19. Nature's Hand

Joel awoke with a gasp in a hospital bed. He immediately took into his surroundings and saw Marlene sitting in a chair beside him.

"Welcome to the fireflies, sorry about the head blow they didn't know who you were" Marlene said in a mournful tone.

The silence was broken when Joel heard small footsteps enter the room.

"Joel! good to see your awake" Ellie said waking into the room. He was glad to see her but soon the lack of a certain obnoxious voice caused him to stir a little

"Where's the boy?" Joel slowly started to get up.

"You don't have to worry we'll take care of it"

"I worry, just let us see him"

Ellie's eyes grew a little with worry when she noticed he wasn't here aswell.

"You can't, he's being prepped for surgery" She said

"The hell you mean surgery?"

"You know about his conduit gene right?" She asked

"Yeah he would never stop bragging and she would never stop asking about it"

"Well you see those born with it are born immune, a few dozen of my men were conduits, each one volunteered for a cure, they all died and we couldn't extract one, but we never had an Activated conduit before!"

"Are you saying you knew about them?" Joel asked raising an eyebrow

"yes" Marlene admitted

"Did he agree to this?"

"No, when we found out about his bites we had to decide what to do with him so we placed him under anesthesia and are now prepping him for surgery"

" Marlene no! that's wrong your murdering him!" Ellie cried out

"Ellie I know you would've volunteered for a cure aswell, you wouldn't want to pass up saving all of humanity even if it meant your life" Marlene said

Ellie was stuck.

"that still don't make it right, he is still just a boy" Joel said trying to convince Marlene to let him go.

"We have the biggest chance to make a cure and you just want to take it away?" she asked

"Find someone else"

"there is no one else!" Marlene exclaimed

Joel walked up to Marlene. "Now you are going to-" A firefly soldier pushed him to the ground "We have a chance for a cure Joel! we have to keep him down if he rejects the plan, than we are going to have an angry conduit and that will be a huge problem" she looked over to the small girl. "Ellie are you sure you want to go with him?" Marlene asked. She nodded and Joel slowly got up "Get them out of here, he tries anything shoot him" Marlene instructed the guard. Joel slowly got up after Marlene left.

When they entered the hall the guard didn't notice Ellie was dragging behind him. He sure noticed when a knife was jammed inside his chest. The guard started screaming and fell to the ground while Ellie stabbed him repeatedly. Joel found his backpack near a counter as the guard was stabbed repeatedly to death letting the entire building know that something went wrong.

####

Phillip was excited. He was going to be part of the team that cured the outbreak that brought humanity to its knees. He grabbed an instrument to cut into the abdomen of the conduit and try to extract the gene and then they would extract the brain to reverse engineer the cure. If a vaccine isn't created through the brain than they could at least reverse engineer the conduit gene to make sure that future new-born baby's are born immune. He placed the scalpel on his chest and just before the sharp tool made contact with the kids flesh the other doctors around him began screaming. When he looked at them with confused eyes he noticed something. There was another set of eyes looking at him! The boy was awake!

####

I woke up seeing a guy in a surgeon outfit about to cut into my chest. Being the rational man I am I summoned a shard of ice and drove it through his chest feeling the same numb feeling as I did when I always call ice. The other end of the ice shard was dripping with blood as it passed through his abdomen. Dont blame me okay! I thought I was kidnapped by crazies.

The other doctors around me started to scream in terror. I fell of the table collapsing on the doctor I just killed. I heard the door open loudly and I heard the doctors scream "THE CONDUIT'S AWAKE!" and then I heard another voice from the doorway.

"Shoot him on sight, he's too dangerous to keep alive". What were they trying to do? how did they know I was a conduit? Who were they? I popped my head a little out of cover and was met with gunshots from several machine guns. Well that's fair! Where was Ellie and Joel? I heard the doctors run for the doorway. I had to think, those people are coming for me. I saw my backpack near some of the instruments of torture and grabbed it. It still had weight that means they didn't steal my crap.

I opened my backpack and felt relief when I saw a certain death can. I quickly grabbed it nearly cutting myself on the blades. I held it on my hands and I threw it at the guards. What I didn't know was that one of them was directly in front of the operating table I was hiding behind and the can hit him right in the face. The explosion sent shards everywhere! But a few shards hit my face cutting me up badly. but not just that. Lets just say I 'modified' it and now it was a conduit death can. The moment the thing exploded I swear I heard the guard say that the seventh circle of hell just opened up. A concentrated blizzard opened from that can with temperatures below that of my body and considering that none of them were wearing sweaters the frostbite set in quickly.

I an all too familiar scene play in the back of my head. No! that was not going to happen again, not this time, not ever again. The blizzard replaced the snow it created with shards of ice so anytime someone was struck a shard entered their body. Boy was I glad I threw that thing cause outside was another set of guards ready to shoot me to the ground. The bodies were mangled beyond recognition. The blizzard quickly died down and the entire floor fell silent with that one can. I whistled as I reached the stairwell and when I opened it and I felt a burly body crashing into mine.

I felt the cold steel off an axe pressed against my throat. When I opened my eyes I saw Joel in front of me with his teeth bared. Then his expression became calm again when he recognized me.

"Ellie close that door we don't got much time!" He said looking behind him to a certain little girl.

"What's going on here guys?" I asked starting to panic

"Long story short fireflies are trying to kill us!" Ellie said blocking the door. "Or more precisely just him" She said nodding to Joel.

"Great an entire army wants both our heads on a platter" I said raising my arms up.

"What do you mean 'both our heads'?" Joel asked "How are you awake?"

"Well you see normal drugs wont effect me the only thing that hits home is alcohol" I said "either way when I woke up and those bastards tried to kill me... tried" I said pointing to the mangled and torn apart bodies. "Why am I in a surgical gown by the way?" I asked

"Fireflies are trying to get a cure from you but now that your awake there going to try to get Ellie" He said running down the halls.

"Ellie you sure you don't want to do this? we came all this way after all we can just surrender" I said looking at the girl.

"I don't know anymore, Marlene acted... different when she saw me again, she seems desperate now ,and that's what I'm scared of"

"Well than let's get moving!" Joel barked.

We heard the stairwell doors being pushed. Everyone except me was surprised to see that the entire floor was clear of fireflies and when we reached the elevator we heard the stairwell doors bust open from the other side of the floor. We were home free and when we reached the parking lot I heard a gun click and when we turned we saw Marlene with more fireflies holding guns at us.

"What are you doing Joel!" Marlene screamed

"I'm making sure these kids live a well deserved life." He answered

"Why can't you see Joel! We need a cure we need to-" I cut her off

"NO you need to see! Conduits are a perfect human, you need to understand that this was natures attempt to bring the uprising of a perfect human race" I said

"What do you mean kid?" One of the soldiers said

"Conduits are meant for this world if you find a cure your just going to create earths extinction date, but conduits can work together, don't you see? conduits will rise from the ashes and build a perfect society and we can bring a revolution like never before"

"Marlene call of your boys and put down the gun, you know he's right" Joel said in a more calming tone.

"We need a cure" Marlene begged

"No! time will heal the wounds just let it come naturally" I said

"Than why not extract the gene?" One of the soldiers asked

"It can't be created manually, it's a birth mutation, like being born with green eyes you can't change it" I said trying to open their eyes. I couldn't think of anything else to say and Marlene still didn't look ready to budge. Just before she spoke for her men to open fire on me and Joel I had to make sure she didn't get a chance to sick her dogs on us.

I summoned a shard of ice and plunged it into her stomach just before anything else happened

"MARLENE!" I heard Ellie exclaim. Just before the soldiers could react I had two shards of ice aimed for there heads.

"Back off or you will die!" I barked.

Marlene fell on her knees and looked Ellie in the eyes while her men stepped backwards. It felt as if they were speaking telepathically to eachother. Than the leader of the fireflies collapsed on the ground never to get up again. We went inside the nearest car in silence, we drove away from the hospital in silence, everything was silent. Just like my life before hand. Unlike last time though this wasnt a peaceful silence. Everything had changed for the worst didn't it?


End file.
